PCA Forums

Well I'm not sure if this is the right forum for computer help but here it goes anyway.

Everytime I start up my computer this screen comes up


How do I get rid of that from happening? I had no problem with that appearing before but now my AOL Instant Messenger freezes right when its about to log in or right when my buddy list comes up. Could that black screen be related to this?

Also my Internet Explorer freezes now right when I start that too.

I doubt this is the work of a virus because I scanned my computer with Norton AntiVirus but then again I haven't had that updated for like 3 years.

I don't know much about computers so any help would be greatly appreciated. Also I run on Windows XP. If you need any other specs about my computer just ask.

Thanks again,
Mike

do a system back up -and be ready to buy a new hard drive -is what its telling you !

you can run maxtors hdd test on it too. its saying SMART (a hard disk monitor) has detected a problem. plus what bellringer said. ypu can use norton ghost to copy your disk. it makes installing i new disk a snap.

i recommend backing up your data...but not a full image copy with Ghost. portions of your hard drive may already be corrupted, so you would be copying over potential corrupt data to the new drive.

I doubt this is the work of a virus because I scanned my computer with Norton AntiVirus but then again I haven't had that updated for like 3 years.

if your virus definitions are 3 years out of date you might as well not be using any at all...you are basically wide open to any modern virus. PLEASE update your virus program. i would suggest just uninstalling Norton completely after downloading AVG from free.grisoft.com...it is a well respected, FREE antivirus program. make sure you download AVG, then DISCONNECT from the internet (pull the network cable from the PC to be sure)...then uninstall Norton...install AVG...then connect to the internet and update AVG. that will at least provide you some protection.

oh, back to the SMART error. that is the hard drives internal monitoring system and can usual be a VERY good indication that the drive is about to die.

The SMART warning is due to a PHYSICAL failure of the hard drive. A virus can't cause this (although you MAY also have a virus since you have non-existent virus protection, but that's a seperate issue).

Do not waste time, do not run the computer any more than necessary. If you're lucky you've gotten some warning before you lose everything, but the drive will deteriorate rapidly.

If you can boot into Windows, immediately copy any important DATA (data files, documents, music, whatever's important) to a spare drive, or memory stick. Sounds like your system is too unstable to trust a CD burner. DO THIS RIGHT AWAY!!!

If you can't reliably run Windows then hook up the drive as a spare on another system and copy what you need off of it.

Buy a replacement drive and you can try to use the drive copy software that comes with it (or Norton Ghost or Acronis True Image if you have either) and clone the drive. If you're LUCKY you might be able to clone the drive to the new one without corruption.

Be prepared, though, that it may not work any you may need to re-install Windows clean on the new drive then install all your apps and copy the data you recovered in the first step.

MAKE SURE TO BACKUP JUST THE DATA FIRST!!! If the drive is deteriorating, the very process of trying to clone it may destroy all the data on it, so get the data off it first.

Hope this helps...

FlyingPenguin I didn't understand that.

I don't really have anything that important on my drive. I am 15 years old lol. So what am I suppose to do? Just buy a new hard disk drive and install windows xp on it? Would this be expensive? Also do computers usually come with a back up disc already? Cause I could've sworn my Vaio came with like 3 or 4 cds im not sure though. Is my drive getting deterioated as I speak? cuase im only browsing the internet. And is it the cause of my AIM lagging and freezing? Thanks in advance.

the CD's that came with your computer may or may not be recovery/restore discs...check the labels and they should say "Recovery CD" or "System Restore" or similar.

yes, simply having the computer powered on is giving the hard drive more and more time to die...it is almost always spun up and being used, even if you are not aware of it.

there may be other problems causing your lag/freezing (back to your out of date antivirus)...you are probably heavily infected with spyware as well...all of that will definitely slow down the pc. add on top of that a hard drive that is most likely constantly correcting read/write errors due to the SMART failure state...and it all adds up to trouble.

a new hard drive can cost as little as $40-60 (after rebate) at a local best buy...or someone here can recommend on online from newegg / zipzoomfly / etc.

backup up your any data first (if you have anything you care to save)...then we'll get to the new hard drive part for you.

Hard drive is giving up the ghost. Replace it, reload it.

First of all I'd contact Sony to see if the system is under warranty. Sony generally has a pretty good warranty and may even come out to fix it. At the very least they may send you a replacement drive.

You can buy any drive and just swap it out. Make sure it's the correct type of drive. either PATA - also called EIDE - or SATA. If this system is relatively new it may be SATA but it's probably PATA. PATA has a wide data ribbon connected to the drive (about 2" wide), SATA uses a very narrow ribbon (about 1/2" wide).

If you buy a new drive from the store it will come with a CD or Floppy that you can boot from and it will run a utility that will attempt to copy your old drive to the new one, which may work since you can still boot into Windows.

The SMART warning is meant to give you a little advanced notice before total failure, but the more you use the drive, the sooner it will fail.

If you want to do a clean (fresh) Windows install (which would be a good idea if there's nothing important on the system and you are concerned you may have spyware or viruses), Sony usually gives you a Recovery CD that makes this very simple. Boot the computer with the CD in the CD-Rom drive (after installing the new drive), and it will automatically restore the drive to the condition it was in when you got it from the factory.

If this is not something you're comfortablw with, most Mom & Pop shops will replace a drive for $150 - $200 (labor and drive) depending on whether you have your recovery discs (it's a LOT easier for them to install Windows from your recovery discs than manually).

Yea I have a recovery disc. If I boot that up it will delete everything but it will be freshly new right? So that way I don't have to buy a new hard drive. Or is this a physical issue I'm dealing with?

The old hard drive is PHYSICALLY damaged. Running the recovery disc on it will accomplish nothing. You need a new drive.

and one more thing



me

By the way, here is the current drive you have:
http://www.maxtor.com/portal/site/Maxto ... 20D540X-4D

Do as FlyingPenguin has suggested. Check your warranty first, if its expired, look for another hard drive. As its a PATA drive, you will see alot of sales locally at places like Best Buy, Circuit City, and CompUSA. Check your local ads to see what you can find. Pretty much anything you will find will even be better then what you already got.

Good luck.