This is just to confirm that it is my HDD that has died and there are no other/underlying causes. So, over the last few weeks I have noticed rattling sounds that occurred every now and again but I'm not sure if it was the hard drive. The 500Gb Hitachi Deskstar only had about 12Gb left and the HDD LED light was pretty much always flashing fast or full on. I knew it had to be replaced soon to speed up my system and TBH I'm glad it happened as it has given me the excuse.
I was using my computer as normal a few hours ago then suddenly I was unable to close anything, and any menu or ctr+alt+del would close pretty much as soon as I opened it. There was probably some hard HDD activity going on as I had photoshop, publisher, itunes and a few other things running. I tried everything then decided I had to force it off, so I held down the power and turned it off.
When I started it up, it all went as normal, POST, POST screen, came up with loading operating system then: CLICK CLICK CLICK. It was a constant, rhythmic sound, i thought something was caught in the fan but it wasn't. The first few times it just kept resetting itself and then it came up with a HDD read error.
So the question is, was it purely the HDD to blame? Was it unusual to die so suddenly? Or do you think it is a problem elsewhere, despite the fact it POSTs.
I'm not really annoyed as it has given me the excuse to upgrade and I still have my ancient laptop with Hidden and Dangerous, Ghost Recon and Jedi Academy on- there's some proper games!
I was using my computer as normal a few hours ago then suddenly I was unable to close anything, and any menu or ctr+alt+del would close pretty much as soon as I opened it. There was probably some hard HDD activity going on as I had photoshop, publisher, itunes and a few other things running. I tried everything then decided I had to force it off, so I held down the power and turned it off.
When I started it up, it all went as normal, POST, POST screen, came up with loading operating system then: CLICK CLICK CLICK. It was a constant, rhythmic sound, i thought something was caught in the fan but it wasn't. The first few times it just kept resetting itself and then it came up with a HDD read error.
So the question is, was it purely the HDD to blame? Was it unusual to die so suddenly? Or do you think it is a problem elsewhere, despite the fact it POSTs.
I'm not really annoyed as it has given me the excuse to upgrade and I still have my ancient laptop with Hidden and Dangerous, Ghost Recon and Jedi Academy on- there's some proper games!
I'd say the symptoms you described are synonymous with hard drive failure. Get a new one and don't worry about it!