Need answer fast, my computer says hard drive failure is emminent, 2 1/2 years old HP, about 600.00. Is it worth fixing?
Yes. Depending on the size, hard drives are under $100.
First thing to do is make recovery disks from the recovery console, so you have a copy of Windows to put on your new hard drive. You’ll need at least 1 blank DVD, maybe up to 4. To get to the recovery console:
“Click Start , click All Programs, click Recovery Manager, and then click Recovery Manager again.
If you are prompted for an Administrator password or confirmation, type the password or provide confirmation. If a User Account Control window asks if you want to allow the program to make changes to the computer, click Yes.”
Choose “RECOVERY DISK CREATION.”
Now you’ll need to grab all your files from your computer that you want to save. Put them on a USB stick or DVDs. You can’t save programs that are installed but you can save the install files to install them anew. But don’t bother saving the install files if you can get them fresh off the Internet. You really want to get photos and documents. And browser profiles if you want to keep all your passwords.
Then you need to purchase and install a new hard drive. I don’t know what you need. Maybe go to Best Buy and ask them. I’m sure you need SATA, you either need a laptop size or a desktop size depending on what you have.
Replace the hard drive, load Windows using the recovery disks you created and then put back your photos and documents. Reinstall all your programs. Good as new.
If this seems too complicated, you can have someone else do it for you. Computer repair shops do this all day long. It might not cost much more than the price of a hard drive, and they might be able to clone your drive thus saving all of your data including your installed programs.
I ended up taking it to a shop, thanks for your help. I copied your post for future use. They are going to charge me 175.00. I couldn’t believe how much dust this thing collected. I have a feeling it may have over heated. A couple of years without cleaning can go by pretty fast.
What has your hard drive done to make it so eminent? Has it published respected books? Received awards from its peers? Served on the boards of philanthropic organizations?
If it’s not too late, now may be the time to treat yourself to an SSD. The prices keep coming down every day. You will love it with every enamored breath you take. I think I saw a 1 TB on amazon the other day in the sub-$500 range.
im·mi·nent
ˈimənənt/
adjective
adjective: imminent
1.
about to happen.
em·i·nent
ˈemənənt/
adjective
adjective: eminent
(of a person) famous and respected within a particular sphere or profession.For future reference you can get a 1 Terabyte (1,000 Gigabyte) hard drive for $55 these days. The weird thing is a 500 Gigabyte hard drive (half the space) cost only $3 less.
After that there is some work on your part to get it all up and running again.
Is that effort worth $125 to you? Only you can say. For many that answer is yes…pay someone else to do it and that’s fine. Seems you got a fair deal.
And yeah…getting the dust out of your PC is a good idea. Do it every 6 months or so. Get a can of air, take it outside and blow all that crap outta there.
Heat is what kills PCs and dust is an insulator.
If I live long enough and stay here long enough I might learn proper English before my ticket expires!
Meh, you could always just blame your hard drive failure on the pope.
You don’t know OP really meant the first word. For all you know, this is a celebrity hard drive. Certainly, we do see a lot of celebrity fails.