Laptop won't load and getting these errors!

[SarahH]

Hi guys! This time I'm getting help for a friend, so any advice you could offer would be awesome!

So my friend has a laptop, but it won't power up anymore and it gets errors like these when it tries to:

Extended Test: Service Tag HT4D0C1

(IDE Disk Test)

1) Error Code - 0F00:0244
Msg: Block 6431959: Uncorrectable data error or media is write protected

2) Error Code - 0F00: 1A44 (IDE Disk Verify Test)
Msg: Block 6431959: Uncorrectable data error or mediat is write protected

He has Windows XP on it with McAfee AntiVirus and he hasn't made any changes to his laptop lately. He just turned it on one morning and these things started happening.

Any help would be really appreciated as always! Thanks for all your help over the years!

Sarah

[Xlphos]

Are these errors after boot up or before?

[SarahH]

Are these errors after boot up or before?

The screen turns on …. The Windows loading screen shows on the screen for about 10 seconds and then the error pops up

Thanks again!

[jbennet]

Go to a command prompt (in safe mode) or use the Recovery Console from the XP CD and type

chkdsk c: /r

Sounds like a corrupted and/or dying hdd.

[Godsp3ed]

Is he using a Dell notebook?? Presuming it i'm giving the following instructions...(note : It will lead to all data being lost but will help the HDD live longer by restoring the image)

Beginning around July 2004, select Dell computers in the Dimension and Inspiron model lines began shipping with a third partition hidden at the end of the hard disk. This third partition contains the "Dell PC Restore by Symantec" utility--colloquially referred to as DSR ("Dell System Restore"). This is a utility that can be used to return a computer to its "as shipped" state, with the XP operating system restored to the condition it was in when the user first unpacked the computer from the box. Pressing the right keys when the computer is starting up will boot this DSR partition.

After the Dell MBR boots a DSR partition as drive C:, the autoexec.bat file runs dsrcheck.exe to examine the disk's partition layout. If things are not as it expects, the restore process is aborted.

Otherwise, DSRcheck restores the normal partition-type bytes and active flag that were changed and the restore process continues.

1)The DSR partition will begin to boot when Ctrl+F11 is pressed at the black screen with the Dell blue line.

2)The DSR welcome screen gives you a chance to confirm whether you really want to proceed. Click on 'Restore' To proceed.

3)The image will be restored, overwriting the disk's second partition.

4)Now click 'Finish' To reboot

4)Since the system has been returned to its sealed state, it will start with the Dell EULA and Service Tag screens...

Note : This document covers only computers that originally shipped with Microsoft XP. Dell computers that ship with VISTA preinstalled do not use this type of DSR system.

After everything is done and XP is freshly installed, run some disk diagnostics including Windows' diskcheck utility...

If its not a dell just ignore this post...

[SarahH]

Thanks for all the help! These suggestions worked well and everything is up and going!

<hugs!>