Windows 7 - Disk read error has occurred Press Ctrl Alt Delete

Hello there. I turned my computer on today. When I checked it some time later, I had an error of messages saying lots of files (mostly .dll) could not be found (or something along those lines). Explorer.exe kept crashing, before a constant bombardment of similar messages came up. After a while, clicking ok to all of them, the computer froze.

When I tried restarting, I got the message
"A disk read error occurred Press Ctrl + Alt + Del to restart"

Any ideas what might have caused this and fix it? If it makes any difference, I am using SATA drives.

The computer no longer boots into Windows.

Its probably safe to assume that the hard drive has gone po....uhh...failed. Or a nasty virus decided to delete everything.

Is there a way to scan the drives to find out, without going into Windows?

What else could it be? How can I be sure?

Could try a live Linux CD I suppose.

And do what?

Use what ever it provides to do disk checking.
I haven't had a need to do this myself so I don't have a step by step.

Boot into Recovery options to run Startup Repair using one of these methods: System Recovery Options

Startup Repair should automate System Restore and System File Checker, but if it fails after several attempts with reboots, boot back in to run System Restore from the Options list, and SFC /SCANNOW : Run in Command Prompt at Boot

Next try entering BIOS setup at boot to set HD to boot first. Test your HD using maker's diagnostics/repair extended CD scan: http://www.carrona.org/hddiag.html Follow this by running Disk Check from Recovery Command line.

You can copy out your files using this method: Copy & Paste - in Windows Recovery Console

Last resort choices are to run Factory Recovery partition or disks, or use a Windows 7 installation disk to re-install windows 7