About 30 minutes ago my pc crashed, going to a black screen when ctrl alt del was attempted. Upon restarting, my computer won't go any further than the bios, asking me to insert the correct boot device. As it won't boot from the dvd drive with my os disk, I'm assuming the hard drive is up a certain creek without a paddle.

So several questions really:

Could it be anything other than the hard drive?

With this opportunity, do I try and set up a raid system so in future I have a spare internal boot drive to fall back on?

Any advice on a replacement that'll hopefully last longer than two years?

I'm running an intel core2duo with a Asus PQ5 motherboard, and was running a 500gb seagate drive.

Regards, Helsing

I could have sworn I got that message when the usual crappy SATA cable had worked itself loose (or more likely, my moron of a mother kept bumping into the tower )...

I't won't boot from the DVD drive either you say? That might suggest something a little more serious than just the hard drive.

Have you taken a mooch around the BIOS at all? It should make any problems pretty apparent.

I always check the basic things first now since I had a problem with a SATA cable and had spent ages removing and replacing everything.

Yep, definately as above, check all cabling and reseat cables on drive and motherboard. If that doesn't make any difference then try changing the slot on the Motherboard the cable is in.

Best way to find out is to download a manufacturer's diagnostic cd, boot it and it will tell you if your hdd is ok or not.

WD's Caviar Black comes with 5 year warantee so It is bound to more reliable than other products.

If it's not booting from the HDD or CD/DVD I would check the BIOS. I have seen three or four PCs in the last month where it wouldn't boot and checking the BIOS revealed that there were no devices in the boot from list...

Adding the HDD back in made them all work straight away, (and these were machines that had been working for years, and the users had not gone into the BIOS themselves)

Hope this helps,

John.

Righty, I've checked out the bios. It's not boot order issues, as I went in and checked that first (in order to get it to boot from the dvd). The processor is reading out fine, as is the ram. Not sure I've actually looked for the dvd drive on there, but I'll check. On my sata slots section, it's not showing any drive at all. I'll try switching its slot on the motherboard and see what that does. When you say manufacturers diagnostic cd, do you mean my pc manufacturer? It's just that it was a custom built jobby, so there isn't one. I'll see if seagate do anything like that anyhow. If both of those fail, I'll order a new drive today, as even if it turns out to be the motherboard it couldn't hurt having a spare.

Cheers for the help so far.

Helsing

Yes, I meant Hdd manufacturer's diagn. cd. I use Seagate's one, it is called "Seatools". They have it so people test their drives for faults before sending them back for replacement if they believe the drive is faulty. You can download it from Seagate's website.

After a bit of poking, I've found that some of my sata ports don't seem to work, but the ones that do work aren't picking up my hard drive (whereas they are the dvd drive) Everything is working fine so far as I can see. I did wonder about the power supply, but if everything else runs then surely that must be okay? I tried Seatools, but it couldn't even see the drive. Unless there are any other suggestions, I'll get my order in. Thinking of a couple of 500 gb drives.

Certainly sounds like it's kaput. Strange that it would take out the port with it (or the other way around) though.

I am not really convinced that it is hdd that is the problem, I would bet on mobo or storage controller instead
It doesn't make sense that some ports suddenly stopped working at the same time the hdd died. I would suggest trying that hdd in other pc before you buy anything.

When using Seatools, have you not noticed the option to test the storage controller? I haven't used Seatools for ages but I believe that it was there. You might want to check for that.

I know what you are saying, and this is certainly a strange one.

Do you have a known working drive you can test with?

It's a fair call. I've ordered one in anyway, as even if it does turn out to be the mobo it's always good to have a spare, and plus it can be the known tester when it gets here. I'll have a look for the controller tester, but I don't recall seeing the option. I'm going to test the hdd in a friend's pc, which should tell us for certain either way. Really hope it's not the motherboard, replacing that would be an arse. Will post back when I know more.

lets hope its not the drive, you could pop the controller/socket on your mates MB!