computer refusing to start even with xp disk,unmountable boot volume!...help!!!

ladyevilleladyeville
edited January 2005 in Hardware
Hi,i came home this evening and found that my pc had shut itself down and was left on the reboot page,disk not found etc.I went to safe mode and attepted a standard start up.This failed and the unmountable boot volume blue screen came up.I turned off and restarted the pc,again nothing but the blue screen.I have tried everything to get past this but nothing seems to work.I read profdlp's postings on a similar problem and attempted to boot up from disk etc,again nothing.The pc refuses to read from any drive and any sort of menu seems to be impossible to get into.
I have not had windows reinstalled or anything new added,and as far as i know all leads are fine and so are temperatures etc of the computer.....any ideas??
Do i need a new pc??there seems to be so many causes,but i cant get into teh pc to find any..do i need to remove hdd and connect to another to find out?
Any responces appreciated as i am a gal erego i know minimal about pc's!!

Comments

  • ArmoArmo Mr. Nice Guy Is Dead,Only Aqua Remains Member
    edited January 2005
    the first thing that comes to mind is your hard disk drive might be dying, or has already died.

    the easiest way to check this is to go into the BIOS. when you start your computer you can enter the BIOS by hitting the del or F2 key depending on the manufacture of the computer. then you want to go to the device setup... i cant really remember what its called, but it has a list of all the devives it detects during POST. see if your hard drive shows up in that list.

    if it does, thta still dosnt mark it out as the culprit, it may just be starting to die
  • ladyevilleladyeville
    edited January 2005
    Armo wrote:
    the first thing that comes to mind is your hard disk drive might be dying, or has already died.

    the easiest way to check this is to go into the BIOS. when you start your computer you can enter the BIOS by hitting the del or F2 key depending on the manufacture of the computer. then you want to go to the device setup... i cant really remember what its called, but it has a list of all the devives it detects during POST. see if your hard drive shows up in that list.

    if it does, thta still dosnt mark it out as the culprit, it may just be starting to die

    hi,thanks for replying,ive been through the menu no mention of hdd,by pure fluke the pc just read the xp disk,i clicked for the repair and just as you guessed the pc couldnt find any hdd drives installed on the pc.....tells to check wires etc but it was working ok yesterday....hasnt been working right since upgrade.....
    I had a supposed hdd upgrade about a month ago..pc kept shutting itself down since it came back...could it be i was ripped off??my good one snatched and swopped for a dudd??
  • profdlpprofdlp The Holy City Of Westlake, Ohio
    edited January 2005
    Unfortunately, what Armo said about the drive going bad is very possible. Before we have you spend a lot of time trying software fixes it would be a good idea to make sure the drive we're working on is worth the effort.

    Do what Armo said about getting into the bios and seeing if the hard drive is detected there. If you need help doing that, just yell.

    If the drive seems to be detected alright then the next step would be to determine the brand. Most hard drive manufacturers offer a free utility you can download in order to test the drive. The brand should be clearly marked on the drive itself. If you need help finding the utility I referred to we can help you track it down.

    As far as needing a new computer, that would depend on a lot of things. If your current computer is so old it can't do many of the things you'd like it to, then it may be time to cut your losses and get a brand new system. I wouldn't trash a halfway decent computer merely over a failed drive (if that is indeed the problem), but it probably wouldn't make sense to spend money on a new hard drive if the rest of the computer has one foot in the grave.

    It would help us help you if you could give us a few more details about your computer, such as:

    Brand
    Model
    Hard Drive Brand
    Processor Type and Speed
    Amount of Memory installed
    and anything else you think is pertinent. :wave:

    EDIT: Sorry - the phone rang and my post was delayed, so I didn't see your response. :p
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