Dell BIOS nag screens after harddrive failure

Simulis · 30 Jun 2012

Okay, I ran HDD Regenerator in repair mode for 5 hrs, here are the final results:

2636 sectors reallocated
110 delays detected
0 sectors remain bad
1060 sectors recovered
0 new bad sectors appear
0 bad sectors reappear

While it's great to have the drive repaired, I still have the original problem of booting into the Dell nag screen. As to anyone's disdain of my using the term 'nag screen', I'm just calling a pig a pig. They could have added a counter and terminated it after 5 iterations...but they didn't. They could have added a convenient button that allowed the owner to redact it...but they didn't. I could stop calling their products garbage...but I won't.

Perhaps a dozen years ago, Dell created a proprietary cable for their computers that when replaced with an apparently identical standard issue cable, fried the motherboard because the pins were reversed. Since then, they have been responsible for many other proprietary nightmares. I guess the lesson is supposed to be 'Buy Dell'...

I'll install SeaTools and examine the options, but I think at this point it's become more a BIOS problem than a harddrive problem. Thanks out to everyone, especially Night Hawk!

Anyone have any ideas as to how to remove the nag screen boot in BIOS?

TVeblen · 30 Jun 2012

Yep. Get the hard drive to stop reporting bad SMART results and the BIOS will stop reporting it.

Simulis · 30 Jun 2012

Ok...I guess I was hoping that it was cached and I might be able to flash or reset BIOS..

Night Hawk · 30 Jun 2012

Drop it in an external usb enclosure and call it a day! For a second internal HD you would simply be better off buying a new replacement for internal storage over trying to disable Dell's or Award's programmed alerts. Those are there for a reason not meant to be tampered with. Disabling Smart Drive in the settings is up to you for that however.

As far as going for the Sea Tools I agree with TVeblen about going with the drive manufacturer's own diagnostics tool despite any repairs seen by the other program. For WD that would be WD's own LifeGuard diagnostics tool if it was a WD model this was being seen with.

I still like the idea of the external enclosure however since that solves two problems. 1) removing a problem drive from the system internally that is. and 2) turning off the annoying alerts!

problem solved!

Once a drive starts becoming problematic in any way you are always going to be better off simply getting it out of your way. You can slap it on a shelve somewhere for a spare transfer drive while for a main drive either OS or backup? not so good!

The usb enclosure idea works for those few times when you need to go between two separate machines like desktop to laptop, laptop to desktop, or desktop to desktop, laptop to laptop. You wouldn't be counting on the drive any longer for the typical every day use.

Simulis · 30 Jun 2012

Yeah, I Installed SeaTools and ran a SMARTcheck, which the drive failed. And your right that it would be foolish to trust the integrity of this drive anymore. I already have 800 GB of files redundantly backed up on the drive and don't want to risk doing any destructive repairs on it.

I think I'll leave it as is for a couple weeks so I can do some cherry picking of files, then put it in my closet for apocalypse insurance...Marked as Solved.

Thanks all, you've been great!

Night Hawk · 30 Jun 2012

I definitely think you will be shopping around for a new storage drive. That is quite a bit to gamble on losing with the uncertainty factor.

On the other hand I've been rather fortunate through the years of being at least one step ahead of any drive fail. And then I haven't lost too many from the old builds I passed along either maybe 3 or 4 tops in the last 15yrs. or so mainly from wear.