Computer Education Programming

Hard drive failure. What I did

Yesterday I had to change my hard drive and had a few issues that I was able to fix.

The problems started in the morning when my wife called me and told me that the computer would not boot. We have been having trouble with our hard drive for a while now and I was able to fix each time by just reseting the PC. This time though the computer was not seeing the hard drive. Using tools and knowledge that I had I had to do the following:

Install new hard drive

First of all I had to install the new hard drive. I was able to do this by disconnecting my CDR and leaving myDVD drive, two old hard drives in the machine, plus a new 80 gig drive with a 16 meg cache. I was unsuccessful at loading Windows though as I kept getting an error as the Windows setup was starting, after loading the drivers I would get an error that it could not load the setup. I switched to my CDR from the DVD drive and had no problems.

Setup Windows

I successfully did a quick format of the new drive (thanks for that new feature Windows XP) and successfully loaded Windows XP. This is pretty basic as I use a CD that not only has Windows XP on it but also has Service Pack 2 for XP slipstreamed onto it.

Rebuild hard drive partition table

After I booted to Windows I saw that my old drive was not showing up as a drive or a partition. If I right clicked on the partition in Disk Management it knew that the drive existed but could no longer find a partition on it. Windows Disk Management said that the drive was healthy, My first attempt was to create a partition but not to format the partition as I did not want to lose the data for good. I fought with this for a couple of hours as I did not back up lately and the wife would kill me if I lost all of her data. In the end I was able to use Test Disk from the Filesystem tools of the Dos Ultimate Boot Disk. It ends up that the partition table had a start but not an end and the program was able to fix this….whew I would have been in trouble….

Migrate Windows and Office data

After I had the old drive back I went into the BIOS and chose to boot from that drive. I was able to boot to the old Windows XP installation easily enough and did not want to keep any of the data there but thought it would be a good idea to transfer my Windows settings using the file and settings transfer wizard in Windows. I saved the settings using the wizard and chose this as the old computer and in the destination I chose a folder I created on the new hard drive called “transfer files”. I then decided to transfer only my settings as I knew that I was going to have to reload my software and would be manually copying over the file structure from the old drive to the new drive.

I also moved all of my settings for MS Office using the Save my Settings Wizard from the MS Office 2003 tools section. I was able to copy the settings, which come across as an OPS file to the same place as my Windows Transfer Files and Settings.

After I had moved the settings and files over I rebooted and went back into the BIOS and changed my first boot to the new hard drive and it’s windows XP installation. I was very happy to see that after running the wizrds for transfering the settings and after reloading MS Office 2003 I was able to move over my mail folder and saw all of my email, contacts, and best of all my email addresses (Still had to fill in the passwords for email but that’s OK). After a relogon I also had all of my desktop settings back includig the background picture of my daughter and the animated Pingu cursors.

Copy data from bad drive

Next I just did a blanket move of all of the files from the old hard drive to new into a new folder that I created in the root of the drive. I did this simply to save time as I am not sure about the stability of the old hard drive and fear that I will lose it again.

Reload software

I have started reloading software but as usual I am going to be slow about the move this time. I will install some of my favorite freewares and will install Streets and Trips, Adobe Acrobat, Macromedia Dreamweaver and Adobe Photoshop Elements and that’s it.

I have roughly followed about half of my Reloading Windows tutorial but since I have both drives functioning at the moment I have tried to cut some corners and make this work well as well as getting my wife up and running quickly for her work stuff this morning.

Computer Education Programming stuff to buy

Pal Pc Tracker - Stops Computer Theft!
Computer software that allows you to find your Pc anywhere in the world if it's ever lost or stolen!

How To Make Money Working From Home!
A practical, Step-By-Step guide to start making money on the Internet using your computer!

Cleaning Computers - Secrets Exposed!
How To Start Your Own Profitable Computer Cleaning Business - Step By Step Business Kit!

Computer Education Programming Recent Stories from around the internet

computer education programming

SUCCESSFUL TRIO: University students (l-r) Phua, Devtar and Raj were the only Malaysians to successfully complete their projects for Google Summer of Code 2008. Three young Malaysians took part in the annual Google Summer of Code and learnt lessons ...

For the love of code - Star Online

For those interested in "Reaching for the Stars," learning a new hobby, furthering their training or earning a certificate in a certain area, then the Northwest Technical School might have something to offer. NTS will be offering a variety of new ...

Tech school expands classes - Patriot Ledger

Santa Ana, CA, January 02, 2009 --( PR.com )-- Hiring a licensed attorney to run the Game Art & Design and Visual & Game Programming departments at The Art Institute of California – Orange County may seem odd but despite his legal education, Ian ...

Licensed Attorney Named Academic Director of Gaming Programs at Art ... - PR.com

Born and brought up with an independent mindset, Parikh was left free to try out any career of his choice. Coming from an entrepreneurial family based in Mumbai, he did his schooling from Bombay International School and went to HR College. After two ...

A multitude of roles - Express Computer India

In response to a successful expanded format in 2008, the SIGGRAPH 2009 Computer Animation Festival will again be open to the public and feature a comprehensive collection of juried and invited screenings that will showcase the most recent advances in ...

Expanded SIGGRAPH Computer Animation Festival in 2009 By BusinessWire ... - DVD Creation

PRINCETON — The Mercer County Technical Education Center has officially taken on a roommate. A Memorandum of Understanding was recently approved by the Mercer County Board of Education allowing New River Community and Technical College to begin in ...

New River to begin offering college courses at MCTEC - Bluefield Daily Telegraph

Unemployment offers an opportunity to learn new skills or improve existing ones through online and classroom learning. There are a number of free and low-cost resources available nationwide serving individuals at all skill levels. There are a number ...

Where to Find Job Retraining Services and Classes - ABC News

Robots are cool -- according to 60 elementary school children who participated in a robotic competition in Mal Ciputra, West Jakarta, on Saturday morning. The one-day event, which aimed to raise technological interest among children, was held by ...

60 children vie for robot cup - Jakarta Post

Educational institutions saw programs change and expand in 2008 and recognition for their efforts. Sedalia School District 200 introduced new programs both at the elementary and high school levels. At Smith-Cotton High School, sophomores, juniors and ...

2008: Educational programs change, expand - Sedalia Democrat

GRAFTON— With a double-digit-percent increase in circulation at the main library in a time when financial resources are thin, the board of library trustees will close the North and South Grafton library branches Wednesday and consolidate the ...