BSOD: Hard Drive failure?

PurpleHaze · 30 Nov 2008 at 21:22

So I took out my 8800GT to take to a friends house. Long story short, I didn't even end up using it and it never left the box. Took it back home the next day and slotted it in.

I boot up and get a BIOS message "overclock failed blah blah bah blah".

"What the hell?", I thought. "I haven't done any new OCing". So I set the BIOS to failsafe default settings and reboot. All goes well and everything is back to normal.

Next day, I boot up my PC and at the XP load screen (before the log in screen) the comp freezes, BSOD flashes for an instant and then I get a "no signal" message on the monitor and the comp reboots.

:mad:

I pull out the card and I try to go via the mobo instead of the GPU and the same thing happens, only without the BSOD. This time I just get the freeze and the "no signal" message before a reboot.

I pull out my hard drive and boot from an old one and, strangely, all is fine.

So I'm thinking this is a hard drive / windows software failure and the fact that I removed my GPU isn't related?

More importantly, however, are the files stored on this HD. We're talking around 300GB of stuff. Not to mention all my applications and settings

Any tips on salvaging files from this hard drive?

Is there any good recovery software you guys would recommend?

Thanks.

Sweeney · 30 Nov 2008 at 21:26

Was it posting fine just loading windows was the problem?

Did you try booting into safe mode?

PurpleHaze · 30 Nov 2008 at 21:31

Yeah, safe mode didn't work either.

Sweeney · 30 Nov 2008 at 21:32

Odd, done all the obvious such as different cables? (different sata port if sata drive)
Is the old system bootable, could try the suspect drive in that to see if it does the same?

PurpleHaze · 30 Nov 2008 at 22:07

Yes, it is a SATA drive.

My old drive, that I'm booting from now, is IDE.

I tried different SATA connections and during boot up I got a "hard drive not detected message", which I thought was strange.

I had a look in the BIOS and all the SATA connections show empty. So I try the original SATA port and the drive now shows up in the BIOS but still wont boot into windows.

Unfortunately, my old machine's mobo only has IDE connections, so I can't try it in there. Don't have any spare SATA cables to try either

To add insult to injury, my DVD drive packed in last week (typical), so I can't even boot from a CD.

Luckily, it IS booting from this old IDE drive so at least I can get on the net and see what's what!

Worst comes to the worst, I suppose this will give me an excuse to buy a Blu Ray drive and a 1TB hard disk when I get paid. :cool:

Might try a BIOS flash next. Don't wanna make a bad situation worse, though. What you reckon?

Sweeney · 30 Nov 2008 at 22:19

Hmm, what happened with the dvd drive?
Slight chance it might be a motherboard related issue

edit: scratch that, didnt notice that you said the bios recognises the drive.

Limited options if you can't test the drive in another system or another sata drive in it, drive could be fully functional just windows having a hissy fit.

PurpleHaze · 30 Nov 2008 at 22:22

Nah, that was unrelated. DVD popped in it and all the pieces got stuck in the mechanism.

Talk about an unlucky string of failures :s

Sweeney · 30 Nov 2008 at 22:27

Sods law

, happens to me all the time *touch wood*

Personally, i wouldn't rule out the MB, i'd get a cheap and cheerful (or as you said, take the plunge on blue ray drive and 1tb hdd) to check if it lets you install windows and function fine with it.