windows and restore not working

[yoon]

Hello!

I have an asus Zenbook with windows 7.
When I was sitting with my computer and tried to connect to an external wifi network the computer froze. So I restarted the computer and tried to reconnect again and then it froze for the second time. This time however I could not start it, since it continued to freeze during the windows 7 startup.
I tried all various recovery methods available during the windows 7 startup without any luck (unfortunately I did not make any recovery point when I first received the computer, so this could have played a part). There is no recovery point to chose from and it says that I have to select Operative system but there is non to select.
Ive tried to download an external recovery for windows and used it from the USB (I dont have any cdreader) without any luck. Ive also tried to reinstall a brand new windows 7 but it said that it couldnt find any drive to install it on. Thus it seems as if windows cant find my harddrive which would indicate a hardware problem. However, I managed to backup all my files using paragon and right now Im on my computer running Ubuntu from a USB, Through Ubuntu I can find and use (including change) stuff on my harddrive which I think would imply a non hardware problem? Does anyone have any idea of what the problem is and how to resolve it?
I really appreciate all help.

Thanks in advance!!

 

[marsmimar]

Hello yoon and welcome to Seven Forums.

I tried all various recovery methods available during the windows 7 startup without any luck

Did this include trying to access safe mode? Or the hidden recovery partition (usually accessed on other Asus machines by clicking the F9 key immediately at startup.)

 

[yoon]

Thanks!
Yeah unfortunately Ive tried those options without any success.

 

[marsmimar]

That doesn't sound too good.

One of our Forum experts prepared this troubleshooting guide for when Windows 7 fails to start.

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/219533-troubleshooting-windows-7-failure-boot.html

Perhaps there's something here that could help solve the problem. Since Ubuntu is working via USB, I don't think that can rule out a possible hard drive failure. As I understand live Ubuntu (which is what I'm guessing you're running) everything is done via the install media (CD, DVD, flash drive, etc) and RAM. So the hard drive could still be compromised in some way.

You can try Ubuntu without actually installing it on your computer’s hard drive. You can do this by starting up your computer with either an Ubuntu CD in the drive or a USB stick with Ubuntu on it in a USB port.

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