Is this a hardware or O/S problem

[bangiepangie]

Is this normal for Windows 7?

I recently purchased a new laptop (Dell Studio XPX16) which came pre-installed with Windows 7(64 bit). On my old laptop I used Vista (32bit) without any major issues.

I duly used Dell Data safe to make a backup of my system before doing anything else. A couple of days later the computer got stuck on 'preparing desktop' and being a patient kind of guy I figured it would eventually load so went to bed leaving it to 'sort itself out'.

However, next day it was still 'preparing desktop'. I had no option than to pull the plug and re-boot. However, now the system would not load at all, and I used my recovery disk to boot up the system and 'recover'. All went well and the first disk loaded up the files and after a while asked for disk 2. I inserted disk 2 and then nothing happened. Again, I thought ok, I'll leave it overnight, but again, still stuck next morning. I tried this 2 more times with the same result (freezing on disk 2). I had no option but to unplug to reset, and after that got a message about missing boot sector or something like that. The machine effectively then wouldnt load anything at all.

Reluctantly (bypassing Dell's ponderous and second rate telephone 'support'), I used a wipe drive disk to remove everything from the drive and re-install Windows 7 from the O/S disk. This was successful and I duly installed all the drivers from the Dell disks provided. All appeared fine and I put all my stuff back on. The following day, windows7 could not find my profile and loaded with a temporary one, minus all my stuff. I checked some forums and solved this by setting up another profile and deleting the old one. Just to be safe I shut the system down, then re-started. All was perfect, and my profile was still there.

I then went to bed and slept soundly, the problem solved and now I could get on with some work the next day on my new laptop.

However, next day the pc started ok, loaded my profile, then spent 30 mins very, very slowly loading up the start up applicantions (mcafee, windows updates etc), then wouldnt respond when I tried to do anything. Ctrl-Alt-Delete eventually responded after about 3 mins and I did a force-reboot. The pc then could not start windows and started a system repair automatically, starting with a disk check which had no effect, then eventually restoring windows to an earlier setup, minus my stuff.

I cant really go on like this, and am unsure if this is a normal kind of windows7 scenario, or a dodgy PC. I am reluctant to raise this will Dell at the moment, based on previous time consuming and ineffective phone calls, where I have to repeat my clear and well pronounced Queens English several times before they understand even the simplest of questions.

I will obviously contact the dealer if necessary, but I just want to check if this is usual for Windows 7. I still have my Vista system disk and am tempted to put that on as it worked perfectly with all my existing software but dont really want to take a step backwards.

Can anyone advise if they think it is a hardware or software issue?

Thanks.

 

[wallyinnc]

Hi bangiepangie and welcome to the forums

It sounds a lot like a disk problem. the first time you apparently had a corrupted boot sector, which should have been resolved when you wiped it clean and reinstalled. Installing from the Dell disk is not quite a clean installation since I believe it will push in a lot of bloatware as well, but the continuing problems point to a hardware malfunction (hard drive or even memory)

I would contact the vendor and try to get a replacement. It seems to me this machine will be a headache if you stick to it.

 

[mickey megabyte]

+1 agree with wally. it seems you have a 'dodgy' machine (to use a technical term).

this is not normal windows 7 behaviour!

oh, and welcome to sevenforums, bangiepangie.

 

[theog]

+1 agree with wally. it seems you have a 'dodgy' machine (to use a technical term).

this is not normal windows 7 behaviour!

oh, and welcome to sevenforums, bangiepangie.

But it is a Dell, which makes it normal behaviour, time they sorted thing out.

 

[steve-pressman]

Ouch, new machine and so many problems, get on the phone to them and tell them your problems and request a RMA, if they play hard to get then demand a RMA. Your lappy should not be doing that.


Steve

 

[bangiepangie]

Thanks for the advice guys, and the friendly welcome. I was hoping it maybe needed a patch or something as I have a lot of stuff to do before September and sending it back to Dell is not a prospect I am looking forward to. I phoned them a couple of weeks ago with a driver query and the guy spent more time trying to hard sell me extended warranty than he did answering my question.
Now I know it's not windows 7 I'll get it sent back to Dell.

Many thanks guys,
Gav