Solid hdd light, disk 100% highest active time, very slow

Ageeb said:

While some people come at this from other angles (software, hardware) I'm going to pursue a different angle pirates712. I just need to rule out some things in my head, hang in there!

1) When you got the laptop did it have windows on it, and working properly?

I got the laptop the summer before windows 7 came out, so it originally had Vista. It came with a free upgrade to 7, and I did a clean install of windows 7 when they shipped me the upgrade disks. One of the disks was a bunch of upgrade nonsense but the second one was an actual install disk.

2) Did it come with restore discs? please answer and if yes, see 3)

No, but like I mentioned above I did get an actual install disk with the upgrade kit.

2b) Did you create them? please answer and if yes, see 3)
2c) How are you installing windows then?
3) Was there a point at which you reinstalled windows BEFORE linux was installed, and it was working properly? Say, just a general format or restore before the HDD death...

Yup! I think I reinstalled Windows at least twice just because I had screwed around with some things (modified explorer files and such) and windows kinda got screwed up. Both times windows installed fine with no issues.

I could be off, but i'm trying to rule out bad install medium.

Well, it originally started acting up August of 2011. I replaced the hard drive, then when I had problems reinstalling I thought it might be the install disk, so I downloaded an iso and that didn't work either (this was Home Premium). Around Christmas I built a desktop so since I was using linux on the laptop I put my copy of 7 on that. Through my university I managed to get a free copy of 7 Professional, which has the same problem, so I think installation medium can be ruled out.

Yup! I think I reinstalled Windows at least twice just because I had screwed around with some things (modified explorer files and such) and windows kinda got screwed up. Both times windows installed fine with no issues.

At least we know you're working from a solid baseline then software-wise. One other thing since I'm thinking of it, does the laptop proceed through POST at expected speeds? As in, when you reboot it flashes your bios and any screens fairly quickly and it's not until it's handed over to Windows that it begins to slow down?

The battery I use in it 24/7 is the original and quite ruined from being plugged in for years, but I have an extended battery that's fairly new that I could get 3-4 hours on with linux.

Ageeb said:

Yup! I think I reinstalled Windows at least twice just because I had screwed around with some things (modified explorer files and such) and windows kinda got screwed up. Both times windows installed fine with no issues.

At least we know you're working from a solid baseline then software-wise. One other thing since I'm thinking of it, does the laptop proceed through POST at expected speeds? As in, when you reboot it flashes your bios and any screens fairly quickly and it's not until it's handed over to Windows that it begins to slow down?

If I boot it not plugged in, it will go through the bios at a normal speed and it isn't until it gets to the end of the black windows screen with the windows logo that the hdd light comes on solid. In other words, the little colored spheres come together and form the windows logo, and approximately when it would usually go to the next screen the light comes on and it slows to a crawl.

I don't remember seeing anything like that in the bios, there are very few actual settings you can change.

profdlp said:

You mentioned a hard drive parking utility. Could it tie into something in the BIOS which needs to be disabled since you now have a different hard drive?

I hope that's it! You'll feel like a super-star if it is

gregrocker said:

Those are drivers loading and you have a hang, possibly from drivers not wanted by Win7 which you provided anyway.

This is why I suggest you get a baseline perfect reinstall for which these forums are the top resource there is.

This was a fresh install, the problem starts during the installation of windows, so I don't see how a 3rd party driver could be an issue.