Start up Snag - XP Home

[Tartan Giant]

Hi Guys,

I'm running a Patriot 3440E with an Intel Pent 3.4 Ghz processor and 1 gig RAM with XP-Home, SP 2.
The PC is about 1.5 years old and pretty stable and behaves well.
NOD32 is the AV suite; I run the free ADaware, and free ZA plus other little anti-spammers.

START SNAG
Of late I have noticed some lack of the normal start-up sounds from within the PC desk-top box......
eg it normally starts with the fan sort of over-revving and then settling down within 2 seconds to a steady pace, and the normal internal fine searching sounds.

Some of the noises (presumably the HDD) are not always on tune with the normal 'chuntering' at times and I know the noise/tune is not quite what it should be (like we know the sound of the car starting; or the jet engine reaching self-sustaining RPM), and the machine gets as far as the point where one selects the "User" - at which point the mouse arrow when moved over the "User" hotspot portion one normally clicks for the PC to get going, NOTHING happens!
It normally highlights as the mouse enters the hypertext hot-spot before one 'clicks' - but on these recent bad days it does not.

I can only revive the PC by doing a 'hard shut down' then attempting the restart after it has settled and quite. Sometimes, it takes 3 such starts to get the PC moving past the "User" selection. All very worrying:uhoh:

May I ask the experts here what they reckon the snag is?

Is it some pre-warning of a HDD failure or some software glitch preventing the start sequence to finalise, because the start-up has been compromised a few times now by something?

Your help and advice will be most welcome chaps.

Cheers

TG

[frostbite]

It does sound like a failing HD to me.

[Tartan Giant]

Thanks Frostbike:oh:

I'll get things onto a CDROM then and await the implosion.

Cheers:ok:

TG

[BOAC]

TG - most disc manufacturers (eg Seagate, Maxtor) have downloadable disc checking progs on their web sites. These should diagnoise a failing disc.

[Tartan Giant]

Thanks for the 'steer' BOAC:ok:

Guess what!:{

Capacity: 203.92 GB
Test result: Self-test routine completed with a S.M.A.R.T. alert error!

The Drive Self-Test has determined that the drive may have one or more failing sectors. Please run SeaTools Desktop for additional information about this problem.
Any drive reporting a S.M.A.R.T. error should be considered likely to fail at any time. You should back up your data from any such drive as soon as possible.

--------

I've ordered an external HDD via the web and shall keep this PC running all the time!

Thanks guys.

TG

[Oxeagle]

TG,
You'll still need an internal HDD to have the OS (Windows XP) installed on, even if you plan on having everything stored on the external one. Get a good quality but small drive just for this purpose. Also, you need to find out what type of HDD your computer has i.e. IDE or SATA? A good website that I have used many times in the past to purchase computer components from is Ebuyer (http://www.ebuyer.co.uk)

Hope this helps!

[Tartan Giant]

Thanks for that Oxeagle

IDE or SATA?........aghhh. The clues I have are:

SiS 180 RAID Controller: Maxtor 6 B200M0 SCSI Disk Device.

When I read the 'tin' when I first got the machine, don't remember seeing anything about a SATA..... but I could be wrong of course........... IDE comes to mind immediately, but that's from other era I think.

I've looked at the disks "properties" and names in Device Manager, but nowhere can I see mention of IDE or SATA.

Where can I verify what sort of HDD I have - inside the tin box egh!!!:{

Cheers

TG

[PPRuNe Pop]

This is a conumdrum BUT..........I would always go back via System Restore to when you know it was working OK. The software CAN seemingly give rise to strange quirks on HDD.

However, 230gb! That's all your eggs in one basket. I have mine in three. That way I have the OS on 20gb drive. I have data on 40gb drive and I have loads of stuff on a drive I use little but to store as much as I want - this an 80gb drive. I also de-frag once a week.

Before you say you have 3 partitions it won't help. IF the disc is knackered the partitions are useless.

I refer the honurable gentleman to the answer I gave a moment ago.

Good luck TG.

PPP

[BOFH]

It's far too big for SCSI - that's the controller.

Smells like SATA, if a quick Google is to be believed.

A few manufacturers offer three-year warranties on drives after the calamitous one-year warranty phase some went through in 2002. I recommend you consult with the people who sold you the box, but I expect they'll want money, so you may wish to pull the drive yourself. The next step is to get an RMA if Maxtor will honour it (wipe anything you do not want seen first :E ).

Please bear in mind that you should either recover or rebuild XP, since your backup (if you are backing up the OS) will be with all the bad sector goodies as well. I recommend the latter, as it's good housekeeping (and discipline for keeping backups).

BOFH

Edited to say: Pprune Pop has wise words - keep your OS partition as tight as a goldfish's bum, so it's easy to mirror, either to another drive or DVD. Anything on a domestic drive must be considered volatile storage...

[d71146]

Hi Guys,
I'm running a Patriot 3440E with an Intel Pent 3.4 Ghz processor and 1 gig RAM with XP-Home, SP 2.
The PC is about 1.5 years old and pretty stable and behaves well.
NOD32 is the AV suite; I run the free ADaware, and free ZA plus other little anti-spammers.
START SNAG
Of late I have noticed some lack of the normal start-up sounds from within the PC desk-top box......
eg it normally starts with the fan sort of over-revving and then settling down within 2 seconds to a steady pace, and the normal internal fine searching sounds.
Some of the noises (presumably the HDD) are not always on tune with the normal 'chuntering' at times and I know the noise/tune is not quite what it should be (like we know the sound of the car starting; or the jet engine reaching self-sustaining RPM), and the machine gets as far as the point where one selects the "User" - at which point the mouse arrow when moved over the "User" hotspot portion one normally clicks for the PC to get going, NOTHING happens!
It normally highlights as the mouse enters the hypertext hot-spot before one 'clicks' - but on these recent bad days it does not.
I can only revive the PC by doing a 'hard shut down' then attempting the restart after it has settled and quite. Sometimes, it takes 3 such starts to get the PC moving past the "User" selection. All very worrying:uhoh:
May I ask the experts here what they reckon the snag is?
Is it some pre-warning of a HDD failure or some software glitch preventing the start sequence to finalise, because the start-up has been compromised a few times now by something?
Your help and advice will be most welcome chaps.
Cheers
TG

Hi.
As regards the fan over revving for a couple of seconds then settling down I have a nearly new PC it does exactly the same as yours when switching on fan revs for a couple of seconds or so then everything settles down the machine has not given any problems though and has done this since day one not sure if this helps you.

[Tartan Giant]

This is a conumdrum BUT..........I would always go back via System Restore to when you know it was working OK. The software CAN seemingly give rise to strange quirks on HDD.
However, 230gb! That's all your eggs in one basket. I have mine in three. That way I have the OS on 20gb drive. I have data on 40gb drive and I have loads of stuff on a drive I use little but to store as much as I want - this an 80gb drive. I also de-frag once a week.
Before you say you have 3 partitions it won't help. IF the disc is knackered the partitions are useless.
I refer the honurable gentleman to the answer I gave a moment ago.
Good luck TG.
PPP

Thank you for the reply above......... and I do wish I had a system like yours! My disk has two partitions, but as you say - useless, if and when the bugga goes bang.


BOFH It's far too big for SCSI - that's the controller.

Smells like SATA, if a quick Google is to be believed.

A few manufacturers offer three-year warranties on drives after the calamitous one-year warranty phase some went through in 2002. I recommend you consult with the people who sold you the box, but I expect they'll want money, so you may wish to pull the drive yourself. The next step is to get an RMA if Maxtor will honour it (wipe anything you do not want seen first ).

Please bear in mind that you should either recover or rebuild XP, since your backup (if you are backing up the OS) will be with all the bad sector goodies as well. I recommend the latter, as it's good housekeeping (and discipline for keeping backups).

BOFH

Edited to say: Pprune Pop has wise words - keep your OS partition as tight as a goldfish's bum, so it's easy to mirror, either to another drive or DVD. Anything on a domestic drive must be considered volatile storage...

Ever since I got the PC I have tried to keep it as tight as the witches ass, and bug free, with weekly defrags etc. but one does not expect the tell-tale signs of a HDD failure so soon, after being careful with the machine. ^^&t happens egh.

d71146
If only the little fan was the worry! It's not just that I'm afraid. Thanks anyway.


Cheers

TG

[frostbite]

"I also de-frag once a week."

Pop! You are wearing out your HDs to no benefit! Once a month is a lot, four times a year is usually quite adequate unless you are installing/uninstalling on a very frequent basis.

[stickyb]

Does xp home give you access to the event viewer? If so, that can be a useful source of information.