Hi All,

I have a Dell XPS 400 computer that is a little over three years old. For a little over a week it was freezing up on me while I would be working on it, and the freezing became more frequent. It seemed to happened when I had several windows open, 3 or more. Over the past several months it would hesitate to open a window when I click on a link. I would hear a click noise and then the window would load up, this would take several seconds. I was told that it sounded as if my hard drive was going bad.

I found a post here that suggested trying to run a diagnostic on the hard drive and gave a link to the diagnostic tool, which I downloaded. My hard drive is a Maxtor 7L250SO. The tool I downloaded and used was SeaToolsDOS. I put it on a floppy and use it to boot my computer and run the test. It said the hard drive passed but now I can't get Windows to open up. When Windows tries to start the POST window opens and then it goes to a black screen asking to click on any key to boot the system, if I don't boot an error message appears saying "Disk Read Error". If I boot form the CD and it loads the Windows files and when it gets to the language screen I try to enter the language and then it goes back to the black screen and it starts all over again.

I read the article here on how to repair Windows XP and got to the screen where it showed the hard drive but it did not have the option to repair it just the options to Install, Delete, or Quit. When it showed the hard drive information it showed 0kb's on the drive.

Does it sound like my hard drive has died or that some how I erased everything off of it? Any other suggestions on repairing the software? I want to keep the files that I have not back up yet, if that's possible.

My system is a Dell XPS 400, Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005, Maxtor 7L250SO Hard Drive, I believe it has a Pentium D processor. If more information is needed please let me know.

Any help with this problem is greatly appreciated, thanks!

This is typically a defective hard drive. Rather than fix it, it's quicker to replace it, put Windows on the new drive then get your data off that old drive while you still can.
It's no good running SeaTools on a Maxtor drive, you need PowerMAX. SeaTools flags up everything good on anything that isn't a Seagate drive. The fact they own Maxtor doesn't mean the software works with the other brand.

This post has been edited by Neil Jones: Nov 25 2008, 05:25 PM

Thanks Neil! I will do that. Sounds like a job for this weekend.

If I install the new drive and leave the old drive in the computer then I will be able to recover my files?

The Seagate web site said it would work on the Maxtor drives too, I think they know less than I...lol!

1) Yes.
2) It may well be that SeaTools works on newer Maxtor drives since the takeover. This certainly wasn't the case before.

Remove the old drive and leave just your new drive in while you install the OS. After you have it running, then add the other drive as a slave to get the (hopefully) files off.

Thanks Neil, you could be right about the SeaTools program, it may work okay and my hard drive just decided to die while I was using Seatools.

Thanks 123Runner, that tip is handy, I was planning on leaving it in but will do as you suggest! I did back up most of my files but I don't back up every day so there are some files that I have to try and get, it may not work but I have to go for it!

I AM A DIFFERENT USER WITH THE SAME PROBLEM:

I have installed (successfully) a 2nd HD with a fresh XP Pro, but it still wont READ the old HD. It RECOGNIZES it, but doesn't show any data (and there is about 40 Gigs on there).


HELP, PLEASE!

I AM A DIFFERENT USER WITH THE SAME PROBLEM:

I have installed (successfully) a 2nd HD with a fresh XP Pro, but it still wont READ the old HD. It RECOGNIZES it, but doesn't show any data (and there is about 40 Gigs on there).


HELP, PLEASE!

Hi giannib and welcome to geeks to go.

You should start a new post, because it will get really confusing on who is doing what.
Even though it seems the same, the problem/ resolution can be different.

Your resolution can be
1. Drive hooked wrong
2. Jumpers wrong
3. drive so bad that it cant be saved

Please star a new post and you will definatley get more responses for your particular issue.