Topic: Boot disk failure ,Insert system disk & press Enter????

[TOFFEEMAN1878]

Anyone?

[Simon]

I think it means there's a problem with the hard drive, Jim.  A friend had this, and he reconnected the cables in the back of the hard drive, which fixes it.  Might be worth a try.

[TOFFEEMAN1878]

Will try that Simon,   I had not used the PC for a few days,I was about to use it this morning, but the screen was frozen ,so I rebooted and got that message......Jim

[Simon]

Unfortunately, it could also mean the hard drive has failed, but fingers crossed...

[Simon]

Just a couple of other basic thoughts, Jim, but have you checked that there aren't any floppies or CDs in their respective drives?  Also, if you can get into BIOS, make sure the hard drive is listed as one of the boot devices.

[TOFFEEMAN1878]

Hi Simon,Just checked all Sata cables power cables etc are secure, no problems!
Restated PC ,still wont Reboot Message now reads " Disk read error press Ctrl Alt Delete to Restart! looks like the HD has failed .............Jim

[Simon]

What make is the hard drive, Jim?  There may be a diagnostic utility on their website.  Not sure how they work, though. 

Alternatively, you could boot from a Windows CD, go into the recovery console and use FIXBOOT.  Might just work, and anything is worth a try if you have valuable data on the drive.

[TOFFEEMAN1878]

Not sure about the drive I think it maybe a 250G MAXTOR ,Would not boot from the CD,  even after making it priority in the boot menu,so i could not use the Recovery Console either. I Think I will have to call the guy who fixed the PC of SWMBO a couple of months ago..................Jim 

[Simon]

Hmm... It should boot from the CD if set up correctly to do so.   Sorry, Jim, we're still a bit thin on the ground for techies, and I've only a tenuous grasp of the basics, so I'm out of ideas.

[sam]

its strange that you can't boot from CD though - if you have enabled this then it should have at least given you the option. Does the cd spin up at all? i.e. is the drive getting power?

[TOFFEEMAN1878]

I dropped the PC off at my Tech guy today,I asked him to check all the connections as well because of the not booting from CD!...........Jim

[Simon]

Sorry we couldn't help more, Jim, but do let us know the outcome. 

[D-Dan]

I wish I'd been here sooner. I'd have liked more info on this, in particular the motherboard and number of drives. Some motherboards have six SATA sockets, but they have to be configured properly in the BIOS to properly enable them all (my own is a case in point, which would only run 4 SATA sockets until I configured the BIOS properly).

Steve

[Simon]

Well, we're glad you're here now, Steve.  We need all the help we can get!