Hdd failure

[lostinisaan]

Unfortunately the OP is not qualified enough to know what to look for. But in no way is a mobile phone nearby going to affect this! There are RF protection shields within a laptop.

I do recall a guy who never had a problem with his notebook, but whenever his spouse used it, it didn't boot.

It later turned out, of course after many headaches, that it was the brace the spouse was wearing that caused the machine not to boot.

A new HD in a case, then cloning the HD, put it in and see if it works without problems would be my decision.

I like this. Must have been infuriating.

Without knowing what kind of brace, I would doubt it was because of RFI, as braces don't usually generate RF signals. Probably more likely the brace was acting more like a wrist grounding strap. In addition to discharging static charges, grounding can also alter RF signals and therefore the RF protection shields.

Like I was trying to indicate in my post, computer components and signals are pretty sensitive to all kinds of things. Without knowing exactly what the OP touched or did, it's impossible to determine what prevented the notebook booting. Everything is a guess.

And considering that the OP didn't give details about the type and age of his machine, nor a follow up post, not worth to continue "trouble shooting" behind the screen.

I can't find the article about the fancy brace anymore, but it took weeks and cost good money to figure out what caused the machine to quit its job, when the Thai spouse tried to "update her Facebook page".

There must have been ghosts.....

Edited February 22, 2015 by lostinisaan

[NeverSure]

Mostly true and what we don't know is whether the failure occurred during a cold boot or warm process or if the computer has a piezoelectric connected to the motherboard in order for the OP to hear beep codes that are generated when's there a failure during the POST (the POST operates from the BIOS firmware). There are all kinds of things that happen in BIOS long before you can even enter the BIOS settings or Boot device selection with a keystroke including but not limited to power supply test, memory test, and other basic hardware tests. Without knowing more, we're just guessing...

Unfortunately the OP is not qualified enough to know what to look for. But in no way is a mobile phone nearby going to affect this! There are RF protection shields within a laptop.The laptop needs to be taken to a qualified professional who's experience in working on that particular model of laptop because the steps vary depending on installed hardware, hardware configuration, and BIOS versions (for example: Boot process order, different keystrokes and beep codes are used between BIOS developers and versions).

We also don't know if the OP disturbed any other electrical connections while taking the HDD out, or the condition of the power supply or connections. The very first thing is a power good signal must be present before the computer will even start the POST. The OP also could have accidentally reset the CMOS settings while taking out the hard drive!

Bottom line... unless you know what you're doing don't mess with the hardware if a computer won't boot! Take it to a professional who knows what to do and look for! Here in Thailand the evaluation is cheap! It's either free or a charge of about 300 baht!

Okay here's the million dollar question? Is it going to fail again soon! Maybe, maybe not. We can't answer that because the OP has disturbed the hardware by taking the HDD out. We don't know what exactly was done, including touching a sensitive component (i.e. accidentally touching the CMOS reset jumper or disturbing a poor connection).

But there are some things that can be done to help minimize the chance... Have the power supply tested, have the laptop and connections cleaned including the memory chips. Have the motherboard removed and checked for possible electrical discharge points to chassis. This should be done periodically. It's the equivalent to changing oil of an engine to prevent engine failure. This needs to be done by a processional as the OP definitely doesn't know what to look for.

Remember the inside of a computer is very sensitive; Touching a sensitive point, dust, or dirty and resistive connections have a dramatic affect. There's a reason there's tamper detection seals usually present at critical points. It's a usually a sign saying: "Stay out! Critical components inside." The tampering of a seal will void any warranty.

Good post. I couldn't help but "like" it.

I am losing some of the knowledge I once had about current models as I am retired. I don't know things with the granularity I used to.

I don't think that machine has a power supply per se. Power supplies are transformers to get us the voltages we need. That would be in the "brick" that's in the middle of the adapter cord for charging. That machine should be made to run off battery voltage without intervention. I remember laptops with power supplies at least a decade ago but that was abandoned, the last I knew.

I believe it must have failed a cold boot. He stated he couldn't enter the bios until he removed the HDD and only then could he boot from a usb drive. It wouldn't start from the hdd. (getting tired of all the caps HDD vs hdd, LOL.) Either way it didn't boot and it didn't get far enough to tell him it couldn't see the hdd i. e. after the post an "ntldr is missing," "boot files missing" or whatever it would say if it couldn't see the hdd. He tells us of the hdd warning but not of any warnings on boot. I don't think it posted which it would have to do before it would look to the hdd for boot files. He couldn't even get to the bios which he should if it posted.

Whether warm or cold boot, it still needs the bios to grab the boot files.

This thing threw up a hdd warning while running and he shut it down. It seems he messed with it quite a bit before removing the hdd and only then did everything else work. I'm convinced he had broken data channels across the mobo, somewhere in one of the channels that goes to the hdd or in the hdd itself - circuit board.

If I'm wrong about this I'll eat it, but when I was IT director, every once in a while a couple of techs would tap on my door and ask me to help figure out what was wrong with a workstation or server. My big thumbs up for the day was if I could tell them without getting out of my chair, LOL. Once a tech, always a tech. It gets in your blood, doesn't it?

Cheers

Edited February 22, 2015 by NeverSure

[BB1950]

First, i appreciate all your suggestions.

Often i i use a scree capture tool and then rendering the video. This results in a CPU usage of between 75% and 85% and a heat of the CPU up to 85-90 degrees. I did this yesterday and after the notebook was able to boot without any problem.

The computer is 3 1/2 years old.

Centigrade or Fahrenheit. If it's getting over 60 degree Centigrade, it's getting too hot!

When was the last time you had the computer given a cleaning service? It sounds like through cleaning and inspection may be due.

[alocacoc]

Mostly true and what we don't know is whether the failure occurred during a cold boot or warm process or if the computer has a piezoelectric connected to the motherboard in order for the OP to hear beep codes that are generated when's there a failure during the POST (the POST operates from the BIOS firmware). There are all kinds of things that happen in BIOS long before you can even enter the BIOS settings or Boot device selection with a keystroke including but not limited to power supply test, memory test, and other basic hardware tests. Without knowing more, we're just guessing...

Unfortunately the OP is not qualified enough to know what to look for. But in no way is a mobile phone nearby going to affect this! There are RF protection shields within a laptop.The laptop needs to be taken to a qualified professional who's experience in working on that particular model of laptop because the steps vary depending on installed hardware, hardware configuration, and BIOS versions (for example: Boot process order, different keystrokes and beep codes are used between BIOS developers and versions).

We also don't know if the OP disturbed any other electrical connections while taking the HDD out, or the condition of the power supply or connections. The very first thing is a power good signal must be present before the computer will even start the POST. The OP also could have accidentally reset the CMOS settings while taking out the hard drive!

Bottom line... unless you know what you're doing don't mess with the hardware if a computer won't boot! Take it to a professional who knows what to do and look for! Here in Thailand the evaluation is cheap! It's either free or a charge of about 300 baht!

Okay here's the million dollar question? Is it going to fail again soon! Maybe, maybe not. We can't answer that because the OP has disturbed the hardware by taking the HDD out. We don't know what exactly was done, including touching a sensitive component (i.e. accidentally touching the CMOS reset jumper or disturbing a poor connection).

But there are some things that can be done to help minimize the chance... Have the power supply tested, have the laptop and connections cleaned including the memory chips. Have the motherboard removed and checked for possible electrical discharge points to chassis. This should be done periodically. It's the equivalent to changing oil of an engine to prevent engine failure. This needs to be done by a processional as the OP definitely doesn't know what to look for.

Remember the inside of a computer is very sensitive; Touching a sensitive point, dust, or dirty and resistive connections have a dramatic affect. There's a reason there's tamper detection seals usually present at critical points. It's a usually a sign saying: "Stay out! Critical components inside." The tampering of a seal will void any warranty.

Either way it didn't boot and it didn't get far enough to tell him it couldn't see the hdd i. e. after the post an "ntldr is missing," "boot files missing" or whatever it would say if it couldn't see the hdd. He tells us of the hdd warning but not of any warnings on boot. I don't think it posted which it would have to do before it would look to the hdd for boot files. He couldn't even get to the bios which he should if it posted.

There was no warnings on boot. The first 2 or 3 times, i saw on the bottom left corner "press F2 for setup". Nothing more came up apart of the Samsung logo. The next attempts to boot, showed me only "waiting..." instead of the common F2 message.

Then again, last night i watched a movie with vlc on the notebook. My smartphone was about 1 meter placed away from the notebook. I got a phone call, and in just that moment, the video did freezing for a moment. This is reproducible. Also the blue screen when the smartphone is too close to the notebook.

[alocacoc]

First, i appreciate all your suggestions.

Often i i use a scree capture tool and then rendering the video. This results in a CPU usage of between 75% and 85% and a heat of the CPU up to 85-90 degrees. I did this yesterday and after the notebook was able to boot without any problem.

The computer is 3 1/2 years old.

Centigrade or Fahrenheit. If it's getting over 60 degree Centigrade, it's getting too hot!

When was the last time you had the computer given a cleaning service? It sounds like through cleaning and inspection may be due.

The notebook got cleaned by Samsung Service Center in October 2013 last time.

It's centigrade. The processor is a Intel i7-2630QM 2.00GHz (8 cores). I did read some reports and articles about which ranges in temperature are normal under full load. It says, the temperature i recognized is ok and common. Under common circumstances while surfing on the net, open a word document and so on, the temperature is around 45-55 degrees.

Edited February 22, 2015 by alocacoc

[NeverSure]

That temperature is high but not the problem. It's not too high, just high. It's happening due to running at full load.

Hot CPU's cause freezes, sputtering, blue screens and random shutdowns and even looping. None of that happened. I ran all of that through my mind because I first thought heat. The cpu was a thought all right. That isn't it.

This machine has something going on that's interrupting the circuitry on the mobo or in the hdd. When that happens one or more channels are lost and he can't reach his bios either. It's failing to boot even at the bios level. It doesn't attempt to POST.

The hdd warning he got was through Windows and it could be that he was losing a channel or more on the mobo and losing hdd signal or it could be a circuit in the hdd.

He is simply losing signal to components. The bios didn't work in that it wouldn't boot from a usb stick either. How could it? It wouldn't post. It never looked for the boot files - a bootable drive be it hdd, Cd or thumb drive.

The hdd had to be removed before he could enter bios and then he could boot from USB.

After he left the house and it cooled down it was all back to normal including the bios, hdd - a nice clean boot and operating.

It hasn't acted up since. It's intermittent.

It lacks hot cpu symptoms.

Think guys, LOL.

Edited February 22, 2015 by NeverSure

[BB1950]

Good post. I couldn't help but "like" it.

I am losing some of the knowledge I once had about current models as I am retired. I don't know things with the granularity I used to.

I don't think that machine has a power supply per se. Power supplies are transformers to get us the voltages we need. That would be in the "brick" that's in the middle of the adapter cord for charging. That machine should be made to run off battery voltage without intervention. I remember laptops with power supplies at least a decade ago but that was abandoned, the last I knew.

I believe it must have failed a cold boot. He stated he couldn't enter the bios until he removed the HDD and only then could he boot from a usb drive. It wouldn't start from the hdd. (getting tired of all the caps HDD vs hdd, LOL.) Either way it didn't boot and it didn't get far enough to tell him it couldn't see the hdd i. e. after the post an "ntldr is missing," "boot files missing" or whatever it would say if it couldn't see the hdd. He tells us of the hdd warning but not of any warnings on boot. I don't think it posted which it would have to do before it would look to the hdd for boot files. He couldn't even get to the bios which he should if it posted.

Whether warm or cold boot, it still needs the bios to grab the boot files.

This thing threw up a hdd warning while running and he shut it down. It seems he messed with it quite a bit before removing the hdd and only then did everything else work. I'm convinced he had broken data channels across the mobo, somewhere in one of the channels that goes to the hdd or in the hdd itself - circuit board.

If I'm wrong about this I'll eat it, but when I was IT director, every once in a while a couple of techs would tap on my door and ask me to help figure out what was wrong with a workstation or server. My big thumbs up for the day was if I could tell them without getting out of my chair, LOL. Once a tech, always a tech. It gets in your blood, doesn't it?

Cheers

Thanks

What is known for sure, the failure did occur before the look for the operating system and that definitely happens on both a cold or warm boot. However depending on the BIOS POST different tests are performed during POST for cold boots vs warm boots.

In this case I'm referring to a cold boot as a boot from turning on power, But on a laptop or notebook that's ambiguous as a laptop or notebook has a battery and the power switch may not completely shut down the computer 100%. It may put the computer in 'sleep' mode. However there are several different kinds of sleep modes on laptops. The computer would have to be shut down within Windows wait for the power light to go out before pressing the power switch to initiate a cold boot.

I'm referring to warm boot as the equivalent to doing a restart in Windows or a Ctrl+Alt+Del keystroke boot.

In desktops and desktops there is a power supply. PCs have always used a switching power supplies not a transformer. PCs have several different voltages at the same time depending hardware and motherboard; i.e. +12vdc, -12vdc, +5vdc, -5vdc, 3.3vdc, battery voltage, and battery recharge voltage. The transformer or brick you're referring to is used to get the voltage to a safe operating dc voltage rather than using 110-240vac. The power supply in the laptop uses power from the battery or brick as input and provides the other different voltages required by the motherboard or other hardware components. A power good signal must be present before the CPU will execute the POST.

If the CMOS settings are incorrect then a boot process may fail but you should be able to get BIOS setup if there aren't other errors. However the first time after you go into the BIOS settings and the CMOS settings haven't been set. Default settings will be applied. That may have happened. The BIOS and POST don't use drivers on the hard disk. The BIO (Basic Input Output) routines directly run only from the Firmware of BIOS and Hardware devices. Including basic display routines. Which are detected through PnP (plug and play) routines. Like I said, a lot happens during POST before you see anything or a key press being detected during the POST. What we don't know are the beep codes that were possibly generated before anything was displayed.

Yes, there may have been broken or shorted data channels. We just don't know. The hardware was messed around with. But a broken or data channel may not necessarily be a trace on the motherboard. It may be a faulty connection or short from dirt causing a data loss. But with the notebook being only 3 1/2 years old. It most likely has a SATA HDD interface which cuts the possibilities down considerably. No more problematic IDE data cable.

The look for NTLDR was a thing from per-Windows Vista installation of Windows. The error message came from the boot loader in the MBR of the HDD. It's no longer used. Windows Vista and up use a Boot Configuration Data (BCD) file, which can be edited, for use with the boot-loader in the MBR. This makes it more compatible with other operating systems to allow multiple boot systems. You now are presented with a menu to select the operating system to boot up when you have a multi-boot installation. Usually something like "No Operating System found" is displayed. Again it varies depending on BIOS routines and/or MBR routines.

Again with the OP mentioning the computer is 3 1/2 years old, it may have a UEFI instead of a BIOS, again we don't know. There are other errors that can prevent the OP getting into the UEFI setup or cause the boot to hang. I found on my UEFI system, a problem with an old USB wireless keyboard/mouse causing the boot to hang. And yes a mobile phone can definitely add to the problem. It can interfere with the wireless keyboard/mouse signals. A BIOS has no mouse routines, whereas a UEFI does. I ended up removing the USB receiver to isolate the problem. More details are needed.

[BB1950]

That temperature is high but not the problem. It's not too high, just high. It's happening due to running at full load.

Hot CPU's cause freezes, sputtering, blue screens and random shutdowns and even looping. None of that happened. I ran all of that through my mind because I first thought heat. The cpu was a thought all right. That isn't it.

This machine has something going on that's interrupting the circuitry on the mobo or in the hdd. When that happens one or more channels are lost and he can't reach his bios either. It's failing to boot even at the bios level. It doesn't attempt to POST.

The hdd warning he got was through Windows and it could be that he was losing a channel or more on the mobo and losing hdd signal or it could be a circuit in the hdd.

He is simply losing signal to components. The bios didn't work in that it wouldn't boot from a usb stick either. How could it? It wouldn't post. It never looked for the boot files - a bootable drive be it hdd, Cd or thumb drive.

The hdd had to be removed before he could enter bios and then he could boot from USB.

After he left the house and it cooled down it was all back to normal including the bios, hdd - a nice clean boot and operating.

It hasn't acted up since. It's intermittent.

It lacks hot cpu symptoms.

Think guys, LOL.

[NeverSure]

Good post. I couldn't help but "like" it.

I am losing some of the knowledge I once had about current models as I am retired. I don't know things with the granularity I used to.

I don't think that machine has a power supply per se. Power supplies are transformers to get us the voltages we need. That would be in the "brick" that's in the middle of the adapter cord for charging. That machine should be made to run off battery voltage without intervention. I remember laptops with power supplies at least a decade ago but that was abandoned, the last I knew.

I believe it must have failed a cold boot. He stated he couldn't enter the bios until he removed the HDD and only then could he boot from a usb drive. It wouldn't start from the hdd. (getting tired of all the caps HDD vs hdd, LOL.) Either way it didn't boot and it didn't get far enough to tell him it couldn't see the hdd i. e. after the post an "ntldr is missing," "boot files missing" or whatever it would say if it couldn't see the hdd. He tells us of the hdd warning but not of any warnings on boot. I don't think it posted which it would have to do before it would look to the hdd for boot files. He couldn't even get to the bios which he should if it posted.

Whether warm or cold boot, it still needs the bios to grab the boot files.

This thing threw up a hdd warning while running and he shut it down. It seems he messed with it quite a bit before removing the hdd and only then did everything else work. I'm convinced he had broken data channels across the mobo, somewhere in one of the channels that goes to the hdd or in the hdd itself - circuit board.

If I'm wrong about this I'll eat it, but when I was IT director, every once in a while a couple of techs would tap on my door and ask me to help figure out what was wrong with a workstation or server. My big thumbs up for the day was if I could tell them without getting out of my chair, LOL. Once a tech, always a tech. It gets in your blood, doesn't it?

Cheers

Thanks

What is known for sure, the failure did occur before the look for the operating system and that definitely happens on both a cold or warm boot. However depending on the BIOS POST different tests are performed during POST for cold boots vs warm boots.

In this case I'm referring to a cold boot as a boot from turning on power, But on a laptop or notebook that's ambiguous as a laptop or notebook has a battery and the power switch may not completely shut down the computer 100%. It may put the computer in 'sleep' mode. However there are several different kinds of sleep modes on laptops. The computer would have to be shut down within Windows wait for the power light to go out before pressing the power switch to initiate a cold boot.

I'm referring to warm boot as the equivalent to doing a restart in Windows or a Ctrl+Alt+Del keystroke boot.

In desktops and desktops there is a power supply. PCs have always used a switching power supplies not a transformer. PCs have several different voltages at the same time depending hardware and motherboard; i.e. +12vdc, -12vdc, +5vdc, -5vdc, 3.3vdc, battery voltage, and battery recharge voltage. The transformer or brick you're referring to is used to get the voltage to a safe operating dc voltage rather than using 110-240vac. The power supply in the laptop uses power from the battery or brick as input and provides the other different voltages required by the motherboard or other hardware components. A power good signal must be present before the CPU will execute the POST.

If the CMOS settings are incorrect then a boot process may fail but you should be able to get BIOS setup if there aren't other errors. However the first time after you go into the BIOS settings and the CMOS settings haven't been set. Default settings will be applied. That may have happened. The BIOS and POST don't use drivers on the hard disk. The BIO (Basic Input Output) routines directly run only from the Firmware of BIOS and Hardware devices. Including basic display routines. Which are detected through PnP (plug and play) routines. Like I said, a lot happens during POST before you see anything or a key press being detected during the POST. What we don't know are the beep codes that were possibly generated before anything was displayed.

Yes, there may have been broken or shorted data channels. We just don't know. The hardware was messed around with. But a broken or data channel may not necessarily be a trace on the motherboard. It may be a faulty connection or short from dirt causing a data loss. But with the notebook being only 3 1/2 years old. It most likely has a SATA HDD interface which cuts the possibilities down considerably. No more problematic IDE data cable.

The look for NTLDR was a thing from per-Windows Vista installation of Windows. The error message came from the boot loader in the MBR of the HDD. It's no longer used. Windows Vista and up use a Boot Configuration Data (BCD) file, which can be edited, for use with the boot-loader in the MBR. This makes it more compatible with other operating systems to allow multiple boot systems. You now are presented with a menu to select the operating system to boot up when you have a multi-boot installation. Usually something like "No Operating System found" is displayed. Again it varies depending on BIOS routines and/or MBR routines.

Again with the OP mentioning the computer is 3 1/2 years old, it may have a UEFI instead of a BIOS, again we don't know. There are other errors that can prevent the OP getting into the UEFI setup or cause the boot to hang. I found on my UEFI system, a problem with an old USB wireless keyboard/mouse causing the boot to hang. And yes a mobile phone can definitely add to the problem. It can interfere with the wireless keyboard/mouse signals. A BIOS has no mouse routines, whereas a UEFI does. I ended up removing the USB receiver to isolate the problem. More details are needed.

That's some good stuff and some a little newer than I am. Thanks.

Any of that notwithstanding, it didn't try to power on. He couldn't reach the bios. All of the software discussion is great, but this isn't software, even an MBR. Not even firmware in the bios. This is hardware. No software or firmware was corrupted or altered during the episode.

It never tried to read the hdd and it wouldn't read a cd or thumb drive until he removed the hdd. Then it would boot from a cd or thumb drive.

We don't know how much was disabled because he couldn't use anything until he removed the hdd. We know it wouldn't post because of the description of how far it got on the screen.

All we know is that when it cooled down everything was back to normal. It's heat related and doesn't have hot cpu or ram symptoms. It has hot circuit board symptoms - something related to the hdd that's also affecting other things on one or more channels.

Cheers

[2fishin2]

First thanks for not killing my responses. Its actually refreshing to have constructive conversation on TV. I actually like the ants thoughts. Ive get those little suckers once in a while, not in a computer but can fully understand how it would be possible. In my last job we had computers sitting on the floor. They would fill up with carpet dust due to static electricity and cause all kind of crazy issues. We would spend hours troubleshooting. After we figured out the carpet problem we put the computers on antistatic pads and cleaned regularly, problems went away.

My guess (its only a guess) its not a cracked mb. Its not running hot and it seems to be running ok now. There are many unanswered questions where we can never know the answers unless we had the laptop in our hands to do the troubleshooting. One thing puzzling to me are these Windows hard drive errors....Ive used windows since it was introduced and never seen anything like it.

As you guys know its extremely hard to troubleshoot over the phone and with a person where you dont know their troubleshooting skills makes it very difficult.

In the end, the problem is "we dont know" enough. The fact that it has been running ok since he removed the HD tells me for sure hardware if a problem at all. The unknown bios configuration and sleep on power off comments are interesting and could actually be in play here. Also dust, dirt in computer could be an issue as he disconnected and reconnected for sure his hard drive, maybe something else too we just dont know.

Anyways great geek discussion

[alocacoc]

By the way, my previous Notebook, a HP device had hundreds of ants in it. It was my fault, because i ate in front of the notebook. I shut down the notebook, put it in a plastic bag and and put a little bit coca cola in to the bag. Over night, all the ants came out. Funny story, but it worked.

Now, all my datas are safed on a external hdd. Also i did create a image of the hdd. If this problem appears again, either i let check the device by samsung or i buy a new notebook.

[alocacoc]

...

Edited February 24, 2015 by alocacoc

[lostinisaan]

By the way, my previous Notebook, a HP device had hundreds of ants in it. It was my fault, because i ate in front of the notebook. I shut down the notebook, put it in a plastic bag and and put a little bit coca cola in to the bag. Over night, all the ants came out. Funny story, but it worked.

Now, all my datas are safed on a external hdd. Also i did create a image of the hdd. If this problem appears again, either i let check the device by samsung or i buy a new notebook.

I really appreciate your technical problem, because the conversations here are really highly interesting.

I personally don't believe in Thai ghosts and it's just my feeling telling me that it's got something to do with your HD, or the connection to it.

Well, you took it out, since then it seems to work well, right? Could it be possible that the connection to the HD was faulty?

I'll send you a link to a nice program that will tell you more about the health of your drive.

And in the future, back your drive up with Acronis True Image, or clone your HD.

If something goes wrong, you just buy a new HD, play all your files on the new drive and all is as it was before.

Please keep us informed how it goes.Cheers.-

Edited February 24, 2015 by lostinisaan

[alocacoc]

By the way, my previous Notebook, a HP device had hundreds of ants in it. It was my fault, because i ate in front of the notebook. I shut down the notebook, put it in a plastic bag and and put a little bit coca cola in to the bag. Over night, all the ants came out. Funny story, but it worked.

Now, all my datas are safed on a external hdd. Also i did create a image of the hdd. If this problem appears again, either i let check the device by samsung or i buy a new notebook.

I really appreciate your technical problem, because the conversations here are really highly interesting.

I personally don't believe in Thai ghosts and it's just my feeling telling me that it's got something to do with your HD, or the connection to it.

Well, you took it out, since then it seems to work well, right? Could it be possible that the connection to the HD was faulty?

I'll send you a link to a nice program that will tell you more about the health of your drive.

And in the future, back your drive up with Acronis True Image, or clone your HD.

If something goes wrong, you just buy a new HD, play all your files on the new drive and all is as it was before.

Please keep us informed how it goes.Cheers.-

Thanks lostinisaan. Yes, my notebook runs very well. Normally, i only do shut down the device when it's necessary after a windows update or whatever. Basically i prefer the sleep mode.

For test-reasons, i did reboot the notebook several times, when the device was warm, and cold. It runs perfect.

[NeverSure]

First thanks for not killing my responses. Its actually refreshing to have constructive conversation on TV. I actually like the ants thoughts. Ive get those little suckers once in a while, not in a computer but can fully understand how it would be possible. In my last job we had computers sitting on the floor. They would fill up with carpet dust due to static electricity and cause all kind of crazy issues. We would spend hours troubleshooting. After we figured out the carpet problem we put the computers on antistatic pads and cleaned regularly, problems went away.

My guess (its only a guess) its not a cracked mb. Its not running hot and it seems to be running ok now. There are many unanswered questions where we can never know the answers unless we had the laptop in our hands to do the troubleshooting. One thing puzzling to me are these Windows hard drive errors....Ive used windows since it was introduced and never seen anything like it.

As you guys know its extremely hard to troubleshoot over the phone and with a person where you dont know their troubleshooting skills makes it very difficult.

In the end, the problem is "we dont know" enough. The fact that it has been running ok since he removed the HD tells me for sure hardware if a problem at all. The unknown bios configuration and sleep on power off comments are interesting and could actually be in play here. Also dust, dirt in computer could be an issue as he disconnected and reconnected for sure his hard drive, maybe something else too we just dont know.

Anyways great geek discussion

I "liked" your post. I agree it could have been a connection for the hdd that removing and replacing fixed. I've actually seen that before.

When I say "heat" I don't mean too hot. I just mean warmed up. I just mean expansion and contraction of parts from normal heating and cooling. That's all it takes to affect a connection or a circuit board.

We still have an issue. The only thing that changed that fixed it was that it cooled down. Now after your post I'll add that the hdd was removed and replaced. That's really a valid thought.

I also agree it's an interesting conversion.

Cheers

[ukrules]

I once had a BIOS chip stop working on me, the computer would fail to boot every now and again. It was obviously some kind of intermmittent issue so I turned it off, gave it a good whack on the side with my fist a couple of times and generally it would work on the next reboot until one day this strategy stopped working. Note - this worked dozens of times over about a year so as reckless as it sounds there is some logic in it. I was working on the assumption it was a loose connection somewhere and a sharp jolt would fix it.

This was a few years ago so anyway I took it back to Pantip Plaza and after much meddling around the 'kids' in charge over there told me it was a faulty BIOS chip.

I'm still not sure if I believed them completely, however whatever they did (changing this tiny little chip) fixed it and it never stopped working after they replaced it.

Edited February 24, 2015 by ukrules

[alocacoc]

I just come home and see the same windows hdd error message again. My data are all saved. Perhaps, i go to buy / order a new notebook tomorrow. The current device i will use it as a media server. I'm confident that i can re-boot this device again. If not, i let try samsung center to figure out the issue. Most likely, if the issue is located on the motherboard, it won't be worth the costs to fix it. Actually this notebook was a very nice device and not inexpensive. It frustrates me to configure a new device. Most likely, the hdd is not the problem....this would be to easy to fix......murphy's law

....one thing is equal to the first time as the error message occurs. At both events i did use intensively soundwire and teamviewer on my remote-android device to connect my notebook.

Edited March 5, 2015 by alocacoc

[2fishin2]

If you get the msg again, take a picture and post up

[alocacoc]

In the event viewer i see this message:

Windows Disk Diagnostic detected a S.M.A.R.T. fault on disk Hitachi HTS547575A9E384 ATA Device (volumes C:\;D:\). This disk might fail; back up your computer now. All data on the hard disk, including files, documents, pictures, programs, and settings might be lost if your hard disk fails. To determine if the hard disk needs to be repaired or replaced, contact the manufacturer of your computer. If you can't back up (for example, you have no CDs or other backup media), you should shut down your computer and restart when you have backup media available. In the meantime, do not save any critical files to this disk.

I didn't saw this message the last time. The last night, i did not restart the computer. Only in sleep mode. Now i will shut down.

I'm back. The restart was successful.

In the event viewer now this error appeared:

The following boot-start or system-start driver(s) failed to load:
UimBus
Uim_DEVIM
Uim_IM

(it looks this is some junk from paragon)

Edited March 6, 2015 by alocacoc

[NeverSure]

I just come home and see the same windows hdd error message again. My data are all saved. Perhaps, i go to buy / order a new notebook tomorrow. The current device i will use it as a media server. I'm confident that i can re-boot this device again. If not, i let try samsung center to figure out the issue. Most likely, if the issue is located on the motherboard, it won't be worth the costs to fix it. Actually this notebook was a very nice device and not inexpensive. It frustrates me to configure a new device. Most likely, the hdd is not the problem....this would be to easy to fix......murphy's law

....one thing is equal to the first time as the error message occurs. At both events i did use intensively soundwire and teamviewer on my remote-android device to connect my notebook.

Hi, I don't understand the last sentence in small print.

Are you saying you ran the computer hard and it might have been warm?

If so did you try a shutdown and restart while it was warm?

If you did, what happened?

If you didn't, what happened? Did it just keep running OK?

LOL. What did or didn't happen and was it really running hard?

I'm still thinking heat... ??

[alocacoc]

I just come home and see the same windows hdd error message again. My data are all saved. Perhaps, i go to buy / order a new notebook tomorrow. The current device i will use it as a media server. I'm confident that i can re-boot this device again. If not, i let try samsung center to figure out the issue. Most likely, if the issue is located on the motherboard, it won't be worth the costs to fix it. Actually this notebook was a very nice device and not inexpensive. It frustrates me to configure a new device. Most likely, the hdd is not the problem....this would be to easy to fix......murphy's law

....one thing is equal to the first time as the error message occurs. At both events i did use intensively soundwire and teamviewer on my remote-android device to connect my notebook.

Hi, I don't understand the last sentence in small print.

soundwire is a android app which only makes able, to stream audio from the computer to a android device. So, on the nortebook is the soundwire server installed and on the andorid the client. Teamviewer i guess you know it. I use it to get access to my desktop. Actually similar to a remote desktop session.

Are you saying you ran the computer hard and it might have been warm?

No. This services don't use high resources. The notebook didn't got warm. As additional information: I do almost every day record a screen show with camtasia. When it's done, i have to render it. This process needs a lot of resources and the notebook get hot. Max load. But even then, never had a issue. Even when i decided to restart after the process was finish.

If so did you try a shutdown and restart while it was warm?

No, i did work for about 2 hours and set then the device in to sleep mode.

If you did, what happened?

If you didn't, what happened? Did it just keep running OK?

Before i waked up the notebook, did check some news and recorded the latest screenshow. Restart was no problem.

LOL. What did or didn't happen and was it really running hard?

I'm still thinking heat... ??

Welcome back NeverSure

Please see the answers within your quote (italic).

Edited March 6, 2015 by alocacoc

[NeverSure]

So Windows itself is popping this warning, or do you have a proprietary proggy for that?

Was the computer hot right when you left it?

We need to continue to try to find a constant, such as is it happening when it's hot if possible.

Right now I'm still thinking perhaps heat and expansion. If so it's either the mobo across a channel or the hdd controller, or in the hdd connections or printed circuit. If this was a bigger computer I'd say clone and replace the hdd and see if that stops it. If not the second hdd could go into an external enclosure and be handy.

[alocacoc]

It was windows itself which produced the warning.

When i left, the computer was not hot. It was also not hot when i came home.

Right now, i do record again a screenshow. After that, i have to rendering the recording which will heat up the computer. But i do this almost everyday without any warnings.

A constant could be, that the computer was unattended when it happens. With unattended i mean, the computer was running but i was not in front of the computer. I only did access to it over the two tools i described above.

[alocacoc]

Right now, my computer is rendering.

CPU Usage: 87.4%

HD0 Temp: 41C

Temp1: 92C

Temp2: 92C

Core0-Core3: around 90C

Yeah, 90C might look very hot. Once i found the specifications from intel for my cpu an it was confirmed that these values under load are ok. It could go up to 105C.

To get this informations i use the freeware SpeedFan 4.51. This tool includes also a S.M.A.R.T monitor and some test features. Result: no error.

When the rendering is done, i will do the extended test.

[alocacoc]

Current Pending Sectors 96. Crystal Disk Info warns about that. So, 96 sectors are bad. I wonder if this caused the problem when i was not able to boot anymore and even was not able to get in to the bios. Possible?

[RichCor]

The drive will copy data and lock out bad sectors automatically and keep running -unless- those bad sectors are located at the beginning of boot track zero (these can't be swapped out).

If the drive is locking out more and more bad sectors then there's definitely an ongoing internal issue on the physical drive. A report should be created to see how far along it is (within/outside tolerance )

High heat be within the drive could be responsible. If it could be determined if the drive or the system generates high heat it would help in permanently solving the issue.

A simple drive replacement may be all that's needed. (Unless there are other issues like CPU freeze/random reboot or memory faults that would point to other more serious issuea.

[lopburi3]

Believe he mentioned changing HDD so that was why believed it something else? Or maybe I missed something as this has become beyond my old memory range. But I also have HDD issues about 6 months ago and after second alarm downloaded Comodo and cloned my C drive to a USB drive I had (was very easy to do) and then removed from external case and installed in computer and all was fine and been fine since - destroyed the old drive..

[RichCor]

[...]

In the event viewer now this error appeared:

The following boot-start or system-start driver(s) failed to load:

UimBus

Uim_DEVIM

Uim_IM

(it looks this is some junk from paragon)

You may want to run ADWCleaner ... seems there are some registry artifacts that you definitely don't want hanging around.

[alocacoc]

[...]

In the event viewer now this error appeared:

The following boot-start or system-start driver(s) failed to load:

UimBus

Uim_DEVIM

Uim_IM

(it looks this is some junk from paragon)

You may want to run ADWCleaner ... seems there are some registry artifacts that you definitely don't want hanging around.

Thanks RichCor, CCleaner did remove the artifacts.

Well, now i have backups and images of anything and multiple. lol

Actually the windows backup and restore function should be enough.

I will keep an eye on the SMART numbers. Current Pending Sector Counts at 96 looks bad. Reallocated Sector Count is at 100. The tool says it's fine, but it should be zero. Then, how i can be sure what causes the issue? Only the hdd or NeverSure's theories? If it's only the hdd, could it make sense that i got locked out from the bios?

[2fishin2]

Could it be happening when your computer sleeps or hibernates? If so, dont let it go into either of those modes?