IT experts, some help needed!

Reea

Hello,


I am having some problems with my laptop (Dell Inspiron, about 2 months old). I am looking for a kind person with IT knowledge who could perhaps help me out. I'm currently using it for a project for my final year in college so I would really prefer to not have to send it back to Dell for repairs. Also, being a student, I'm a wee bit broke, so I'm just looking for someone who won't charge a lot/at all!


Please do e-mail me if you think you can help me out, I'd be extremely grateful!


Louise

Quigs Snr

Meet us halfway here ! Post up a description of your problem.

Conor108

And should you have to send it back to Dell (Unlikely with the combined brainpower of boards.ie users:)) make sure you back up your data!

Reea

Ok, great: three days ago, my laptop suddenly wouldn't turn on properly. The screen is black with white writing ad it says something about a pssoible hardware or software problem. It gives me two options - to start in normal mode or to try find/solve problem..neither of which work and only bring me back to the black screen again. I've tried it several times and the same thing keeps happening.. Does that give you any clues?!? Thank you!

Cantab.

Reea wrote: »

Ok, great: three days ago, my laptop suddenly wouldn't turn on properly. The screen is black with white writing ad it says something about a pssoible hardware or software problem. It gives me two options - to start in normal mode or to try find/solve problem..neither of which work and only bring me back to the black screen again. I've tried it several times and the same thing keeps happening.. Does that give you any clues?!? Thank you!

Why don't you post the exact error message? (i.e. word for word) Error messages are written to spew out *stuff* for a reason you know...

Did you add any software or hardware recently? If so, what.

Did you make any configuration changes recently? If so, what.

When was the last time you re-started your computer successfully? Or do you usually just hibernate your machine instead of restarting?

Singer73

Sounds like your hard drive is fried. Have you got any important documents on there which you haven't backed up? The most likely solution (if your Hard drive is OK) is having to reset the machine to factory mode, which will mean you will lose any data on it that wasn't there originally.

Reea

I was hoping you wouldn't say that! Yeah, there's a few important things on there, but nothing vital.. It's hard to believe it's fried if it's only two months old though.

Cantab, as I'm writing this from the library, I dont have my laptop with me so I can't get the exact error message right now, but I can post it later if needs be...yes, I agree, that 'stuff' is quite important! I usually shut it down completely, only hibernate for short periods of time. Also, I haven't added any new software or hardware lately, apart from iTunes and fujifilm about a month ago...

You're all very helpful, thanks again!

Standard Toaster

Where are u based??

Tom Dunne

Singer73 wrote: »

Sounds like your hard drive is fried.

I'm sorry, but that is utter nonsense.

You can't diagnose a problem with such little information. It does appear Windows is attempting to boot, hence the option to go into Safe Mode. A fried hard drive would prevent Windows from booting at all.

Posting up the exact error, word for word, is the only way to start diagnosing the problem.

Alanstrainor

+1 to that.
once you get back to us with the exact error we might be able to diangnose the Problem. Until then it's just guess work.

Reea

I'm based in city centre, south.

Tom Dunne wrote: »

I'm sorry, but that is utter nonsense.

You can't diagnose a problem with such little information. It does appear Windows is attempting to boot, hence the option to go into Safe Mode. A fried hard drive would prevent Windows from booting at all.

Posting up the exact error, word for word, is the only way to start diagnosing the problem.

Phew! Super, I can get that message for you, it may take a wee while, but I'm going home soon, I'll write it down and get back to you!

Reea

Alright, here's what it has to say:

"Windows failed to start. A recent hardware or software change might be the cause.

If Windows files have been damaged or configured incorrectly, Startup repair can help diagnose and fix the problem. If power was interrupted during Startup, choose 'Start Windows normally'"

Then I'm given two options:

1 Launch Startup repair
2 Start Windows normally

Both of these just lead me back to the original message error.

Any thoughts?

Saruman

Try last known good using F8 to bring up the startup screen during boot.
im assuming its vista from the sound of things so: http://windowshelp.microsoft.com/Windows/en-us/help/f9c50a72-04ec-4088-9fd4-a4f979eef5a71033.mspx

Reea

Thanks. I've tried pressing F8 (a lot!) and no joy. However, when I looked at that link, it suggested using my Windows Installation disk. I'll do that tonight, but my laptop is being very unresponsive to anything I try so I'm not sure if it will play the disk...it's worth a shot though, I guess! Fingers crossed..

AlmightyCushion

It sounds like your windows install is buggered. A bit of a pain in the ass but it's nothing major. If you insert the windows cd (all dells I've seen shipped in the past year or so come with the windows cd which is pretty sweet) then it will attempt to repair it using the files on the cd. This will leave all your data intact and it will be like nothing ever happened (it might be a bit on the slow side though).

If that doesn't work you can re-install windows. You should have a recovery partition on the drive that can do this for you. This will make your computer like it was shipped from the factory so all data and software you put on it will be gone. It should fix it though.

Reea

Thank you! I just had a look there at the CDs I got with my Dell but the only Windows related one seemed to be for Microsoft Office. Perhaps I didn't read them correctly, I'd better double check!

Otherwise, it's a slight relief to know I won't have to send it off to Dell, but I have college work, music etc on there that I would really love to get back...is there *any* way this can be done??!

Webmonkey

Reea wrote: »

Thank you! I just had a look there at the CDs I got with my Dell but the only Windows related one seemed to be for Microsoft Office. Perhaps I didn't read them correctly, I'd better double check!

Otherwise, it's a slight relief to know I won't have to send it off to Dell, but I have college work, music etc on there that I would really love to get back...is there *any* way this can be done??!

Well I'm guessing you don't have an XP/Vista CD because as far as I know, Dell ship their laptops/pcs with a hidden recovery partition (DSR). To enter this usually, hold down the CTRL+F11 key during startup.

However, this recovery operation restores the laptop to way it was day one and will destory your documents.

Getting files off the laptop can involve taking the 2.5" hard drive out and putting it into a 2.5" enclosure.
You could boot in with a bootup CD and view your files, but moving them to another computer could involve mounting a network share and connecting from another computer.

Or better still download a Live CD for a Linux Distro. Boot this and stick in a USB key and copy your files off from your local drive.

http://lifehacker.com/software/top/geek-to-live--rescue-files-with-a-boot-cd-192982.php Might help.

Then you can restore afterwards, might be easiest option if you don't have a XP CD to repair the XP installation. Someone with a bit of know how can still fix this problem while maintaining the way your laptop was, but if you don't mind losing your programs and environment, then maybe copying files first and doing a restore might be your best bet.

AlmightyCushion

Webmonkey wrote: »

Well I'm guessing you don't have an XP/Vista CD because as far as I know, Dell ship their laptops/pcs with a hidden recovery partition (DSR). To enter this usually, hold down the CTRL+F11 key during startup.

As far as I know Dell still ship the windows cds with their laptops and computers.

Webmonkey

AlmightyCushion wrote: »

As far as I know Dell still ship the windows cds with their laptops and computers.

Cool, amn't up to date with what Dell do these days. Would make sense as I think people would prefer something tangible to hold onto incase they need to recover.

Reea

Webmonkey wrote: »

Getting files off the laptop can involve taking the 2.5" hard drive out and putting it into a 2.5" enclosure.
You could boot in with a bootup CD and view your files, but moving them to another computer could involve mounting a network share and connecting from another computer.

Or better still download a Live CD for a Linux Distro. Boot this and stick in a USB key and copy your files off from your local drive.

http://lifehacker.com/software/top/geek-to-live--rescue-files-with-a-boot-cd-192982.php Might help.

Then you can restore afterwards, might be easiest option if you don't have a XP CD to repair the XP installation. Someone with a bit of know how can still fix this problem while maintaining the way your laptop was, but if you don't mind losing your programs and environment, then maybe copying files first and doing a restore might be your best bet.

Right, I was following you until this whole bit...from what I understand, it sounds good though, as I get to keep the files. Will this be costly or extremely time consuming?

You mentionned network sharing, I'm on my college's network--is that the same thing?

Now, where can I go to find someone to do this?

Thank again

AlmightyCushion

Webmonkey wrote: »

Cool, amn't up to date with what Dell do these days. Would make sense as I think people would prefer something tangible to hold onto incase they need to recover.

Yeah I've seen them come in a couple of different ranges (studio, inspiron and vostro). It's very handy if your hard drive or if you decide to upgrade it. I really wish other manufacturers would do it. Spend ages trying to get my hands on a xp home disk to nlite for my advent 4211.

Webmonkey

Reea wrote: »

Right, I was following you until this whole bit...from what I understand, it sounds good though, as I get to keep the files. Will this be costly or extremely time consuming?

You mentionned network sharing, I'm on my college's network--is that the same thing?

Now, where can I go to find someone to do this?

Thank again

I would download this: http://www.mirrorservice.org/sites/ftp.uni-kl.de/pub/linux/knoppix/KNOPPIX_V5.1.1CD-2007-01-04-EN.iso

Burn this to CD....Hopefully which ever computer has facilaties to burn a ISO. If no burning software, try http://cdburnerxp.se/ if you don't have any.

Then stick this into your laptop, hopefully boot right into this CD. If not, there is usually a key to press so you can boot from CD.

Then when you boot into this CD, you have a windows like desktop, Linux.

If you follow instructions on this site http://lifehacker.com/software/top/geek-to-live--rescue-files-with-a-boot-cd-192982.php you should be grand. It looks very detailed.

Hope this helps

Reea

Ok, thank you. Right, this is getting very complicated. I'm feeling very out of my depth here and all I have is a library computer to do all this downloading and burning. I think I should go talk to someone face to face in a shop about it, because I doubt I can do this myself and I need to get it working asap for college assignments..

Do you have any recommendations/know anyone who could help?

Webmonkey

Reea wrote: »

Ok, thank you. Right, this is getting very complicated. I'm feeling very out of my depth here and all I have is a library computer to do all this downloading and burning. I think I should go talk to someone face to face in a shop about it, because I doubt I can do this myself and I need to get it working asap for college assignments..

Do you have any recommendations/know anyone who could help?

I'd help you myself but I am way down in Kerry unfort!

It really isn't as complicated as it sounds - Can you burn CDs in your library? - I'm sure someone around in college will give ya hand, you got a friend that can download this? - If so burninng the ISO is very simple and straight forward.

Then you can boot this CD, almost automatic. Then you will have a Linux desktop environment that is similar to windows, I'm sure you'll work it out alright if ya put your mind to it - Not much can go wrong as long as you don't restore your computer too soon, losing your files. Leave that step until after when you actually get your files.

Reea

Thanks, webmonkey, I can try call into a friend tomorrow, see how that goes.

Does anyone else know somewhere/someone with good know-how?

mick84

Reea , looks like it a issue with the O/S startup files not a big problem and I would suggest you do not try a repair with a windows xp or windows vista cd unless you are 100% sure what you are doing.

Have a look at this post I created , it will let you know what the problem is and
hopefully resolve it.

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055446898

If I was you I would look into backing up my harddisk first before messing around with O/S. From reading the other comments people are making suggestions that could completely wipe out your harddisk meaning no more College work on the hard disk.
To backup your harddisk you will have to buy a small device for around 10 euro