Need a second opinion on this diagnosis.

[JosiahBradley]

I don't normally ask for help, but when I do I trust your opinions. A PC I helped purchase as a gift for a friend a year or so ago seems to be dying a most unusual death and it is being a real trouble trying to figure out exactly what is going wrong. So let me list what happened and what I have done so far:

- Windows stopped booting claiming it was missing a ton of .ddls
- Virus or bad HDD?
- Gut instinct was bad HDD and after a quick forced check disc using my trusty gentoo livecd, I seemed to be right.
- The disc had several thousand errors and deleted a handful or completely corrupt files.
- Next I needed to save the data and luckily using gentoo I was able to back up all of their data to an external HD.
- So onto killing the old disc off to make sure they needed a new one
- Reinstalled Win7, took a lot longer than normal, so OK disc must be bad.
- Wait a second, it completed installation just fine.
- Installed all the drivers needed.
- Recreated the lost user accounts.
- Why is this working still? Perhaps it was just a bad day for the HD.

Okay so I think my work is complete, show my friend how to get to everything that was moved around during the re-install and advise them that they need to re-install any missing programs. If it was a bad HD, then the several hours I spent torturing it should of killed it somehow. I go home and the next day they send me a picture of a BSOD, a common IRQ less than equal most likely driver or ram problem error. Ok so the disc has got to be bad, it most have corrupted some more files and now I know what needs fixing.

I return and using my trusty gentoo disc again I boot into memtest to make sure the RAM is good. Run a low level HDD diagnostic tool to check the platters, it goes several hundred blocks and hits some bad parts and repeats pretty consistently. Everything is pointing to this disc being bad right now, but here's were things get weird. I boot into gentoo again to check if any files were left alive on the disc and suddenly the keyboard starts acting really strange. I hit a key and it takes about 5-10 seconds to appear then it types 5-6 of the character I pressed once. Ok perhaps it's the crappy USB keyboard which I know freak out sometimes. So I get another keyboard and reboot. Same exact problem. Go back into the BIOs and memtest and everything works fine, but anything that requires an OS immediately goes back into running extremely sluggish.

So my question is, could the real problem here by a dying motherboard that is having a lot of troubles, causing disc errors, etc.?

I didn't want my friends family to end up buying a new HD and find out they really needed a new motherboard which would put the repair cost at higher than the machine's cost to build (it was a black Friday special).

Thanks for any suggestions.

 

[Magnus]

Get a new HDD. Even if the MB does have problems, you won't lose anything by getting a new HDD as it can be used regardless.

 

[Aaron_ATX]

Sounds like the HD to me. What type of drive is it? Over the last 2-3 years many of the seagate barracuda drives i've used for other peoples builds have been dieing left and right. Similar issues like you described.....

 

[JosiahBradley]

One extra bit of info in case I forgot to include it. When everything started acting sluggish, I had disconnected the old HDD from the system. That's why I was starting to lean towards mobo issues. The thing is HD prices just shot up like crazy and I'm in no need of an extra HDD in case it ends up being the mobo. I'd be burning that money as I'm going to eat any cost not directly related to the fix. This is for a friend so I'm not charging them anything beyond parts, and only parts that get used.

Thanks for the quick responses.

 

[Magnus]

One extra bit of info in case I forgot to include it. When everything started acting sluggish, I had disconnected the old HDD from the system. That's why I was starting to lean towards mobo issues. The thing is HD prices just shot up like crazy and I'm in no need of an extra HDD in case it ends up being the mobo. I'd be burning that money as I'm going to eat any cost not directly related to the fix. This is for a friend so I'm not charging them anything beyond parts, and only parts that get used.

Thanks for the quick responses.

I'm confused now, you "disconnected the old HDD" meaning it already has a new HDD?

 

[hossdaddy]

why don't you try the suspect hd in a different computer? dl wd arconis software and run some tests on it.

Just test one thing at a time.

 

[JosiahBradley]

I'm confused now, you "disconnected the old HDD" meaning it already has a new HDD?

I'm running off a Live CD. I disconnected the HDD to see if it was what was causing the massive slowdown, sometimes happens when the drive isn't using power correctly or the controller is going, locks up things sometimes. I'm guessing it's both the HD and the mobo then. Sigh it's like rebuilding the entire PC. During this testing phase it's gone through 3 different Windows installs all of which have failed shortly after.

I know that with retail copies of Win7 you can swap a mobo out and the license sticks with you, but what about OEM copies that come pre-installed? Do I have to get a brand new license now too? This was the case when I swapped out my old old AMD 2700 when using WinXP.

 

[JosiahBradley]

why don't you try the suspect hd in a different computer? dl wd arconis software and run some tests on it.

Just test one thing at a time.

I actually offered to do that but the family doesn't want me to take anything out of the house, and my PC weighs over 60lbs and I live 30 miles away. People can be real difficult even when you're not charging them.

 

[hossdaddy]

wow how ignorant is that. Why don't you show them how much bestbuy charges for computer analysis and repair then re-ask them if you can take the hd with you?

 

[Aaron_ATX]

I've been in that situation before, do someone a favor, something goes wrong with the machine a year later and then they seem to think it is somehow your fault that the comp is having problems.

If it was a bad HD, then the several hours I spent torturing it should of killed it somehow.

Nah, I have seen plenty of harddrives die slow, annoying deaths.

Do you have ANY spare harddrives? I mean even a pata drive with a sata converter would get them by. No matter how crappy or outdated it is, toss it in the machine and try a reinstall. From what you are describing it sounds like the drive (or MAYBE a cable) is on its way out. The likelyhood of the mobo and hd failing at once is very low.

Or just convince them to take the machine....I mean would they rather have a computer that doesnt work or one that isnt there? Not really much difference....

 

[Magnus]

I'm running off a Live CD. I disconnected the HDD to see if it was what was causing the massive slowdown, sometimes happens when the drive isn't using power correctly or the controller is going, locks up things sometimes. I'm guessing it's both the HD and the mobo then. Sigh it's like rebuilding the entire PC. During this testing phase it's gone through 3 different Windows installs all of which have failed shortly after.

I know that with retail copies of Win7 you can swap a mobo out and the license sticks with you, but what about OEM copies that come pre-installed? Do I have to get a brand new license now too? This was the case when I swapped out my old old AMD 2700 when using WinXP.

Generally, with OEM versions that came pre installed, you have to buy a repair/reinstall disk from the company that built the box. It comes with all the original bloatware but, is generally cheaper than a new OS.