Solved Hard Drive Issues Regarding Windows

[Tiamarth]

See this thread for hardware specs.

Recently Windows stopped booting on my PC. I was told by a professional that re-installing was probably my best bet, I had figured as much, but I wanted a second opinion.

Then from the thread I linked above, I was told that my hard drive was likely dead. So, two questions; 1. Is a hard drive truly dead if it is detected by BIOS and can be edited in other operating systems? 2. Is it possible to install Windows to an external hard drive?

 

[Ztruker]

1. Maybe, maybe not. Check the hard drive with the manufacturer's diagnostic tools.
Hard Drive Diagnostics Tools and Utilities (Storage) - TACKtech Corp.
Bootable Hard Drive Diagnostics

2. No, Windows will not install to a removable drive.

 

[Tiamarth]

Thanks, I'll try these.

 

[karlsnooks]

Tiamarth
Update your SevenForums System Specs
User CP (located on the top menu bar) |
Your Profile | Edit System Spec (left-hand column)

To gather info, use Speccy (my favorite) or SIW or System Info

In the System Manufacturer Block, enter:
Manufacturer and Model and
ADD the word laptop, desktop, netbook or tablet.
For example:
Toshiba Satellite L305D notebook.

Provide full windows version info, for example:
MS Windows 7 Ultimate SP1 64-bit

Use the “Other Info” block for Optical Reader,
Mouse, touchpad, wifi adapter, speakers, monitor, etc

Scroll down and click on SAVE CHANGES.

You will find that in Speccy, you can select info from the display
using your mouse/touchpad and then paste that info into your specs.

SIW is a marvelous program, but the free version does not offer
this capability.

 

[GTraymond2820]

Try Disk check and see if there are any errors

 

[Tiamarth]

Tiamarth
Update your SevenForums System Specs

The problem with that is that the problem computer cannot be booted. Which was the purpose of my posting on these forums in the first place. If I gave you the specs of the computer I am on right now it wouldn't help me or you in the slightest, because this computer (though it is very old and nearly useless) is running just fine. I am still in the process of doing what Ztruker suggested, I will post the results when I am finished.

However,

Try Disk check and see if there are any errors

In afterthought, I really should have done this to begin with. So I'll just go ahead and do that now, lol. (Better late than never.)

 

[Tiamarth]

Yeah, thanks for the help guys. The hard drive is definitely gone and dead. Luckily I am one of the few people that took the droning advice and made backups of my files. That's not what's bothering me. What is bothering me is that I can't afford a new hard drive unless it is $50ish.

So, before I mark this as solved, are you absolutely positive that Windows cannot be installed on an external hard drive? If it can't, does anyone know where I can buy a hard drive that is in the $50ish range?

 

[Ztruker]

Windows will not install on an external hard drive. Do a Google search on install windows 7 on external hard drive

How big? SATA or PATA (IDE)?

I would try Ebay and a Google search for cheap xxxgb ide hard drives or cheap xxxgb sata hard drives (xxx is size in Gigabytes).

 

[bigmck]

Yeah, thanks for the help guys. The hard drive is definitely gone and dead. Luckily I am one of the few people that took the droning advice and made backups of my files. That's not what's bothering me. What is bothering me is that I can't afford a new hard drive unless it is $50ish.

So, before I mark this as solved, are you absolutely positive that Windows cannot be installed on an external hard drive? If it can't, does anyone know where I can buy a hard drive that is in the $50ish range?

I just did a quick search and here are some 160 GB in your price range.
http://www.pricegrabber.com/sata+ha...rd drive 160 gb/skd=1/mode=pg_google_us_broad

 

[Tiamarth]

Windows will not install on an external hard drive. Do a Google search on install windows 7 on external hard drive

Thanks, doing a Google search of that exact phrase led me to a video tutorial on installing Windows 7 to an external hard drive. I am now typing this on the computer that was causing problems, using the external hard drive rather than the internal one.

I just did a quick search and here are some 160 GB in your price range.
Sata Hard Drive 160 Gb Search Results - Find cheap prices for Seagate Barracuda 7200.7 ST3160023AS 160 GB - PriceGrabber

And thank you, I may be using an external hard drive as of right now, but I don't plan on using it as a permanent fix.

 

[Ztruker]

I did not think you could do that (obviously), thanks for the link, I'll give it a try.

Did you actually do the install from the external hard drive by copying the DVD data to it as the tutorial showed or did you install from DVD?

Is this a violation of the TOU?

 

[Tiamarth]

I did everything the tutorial said to do. It worked perfectly. (So yes, I copied the files to the hard drive.)