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Laptop Harddrive problem, need help pleeeease!

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rcook99

New Member
The computer with the problem is a 3-4yr old Dell Inspiron 6000 with I believe a 60g but maybe an 80g hard drive. My problem is that it seems the drive is not spinning up and I can't even get into the control panel, I can't get online with it and it won't even open the c: drive. If I put a USB flash drive on it, it will open it but I can't move anything to it. I was able to move some stuff off of it this morning but it seems to not want to allow me to work on it at all. Tried clicking on the icon for internet explorer and nothing happens. What can I do to get the rest of the folders off as I still have a few that need to be moved. It is not on a network. I would like to try a reboot but am afraid that if I try this it will not boot at all, if this happens is it still possible to pull files off the drive and if so with what software!:banghead::banghead::doh::doh:
 
WhiskeyDreamer

WhiskeyDreamer

Professional Snow Ninja
i will never claim to be a computer whiz...but have you checked it for viruses and spyware? i wouldn't want to move files off that computer and onto another if there's a possibility they could be infected....
 
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rcook99

New Member
I run spybot S&D and also AVG regularly. My problem is that I can't get the computer to do much of anything but looking at the main desktop. I am also not a computer GURU but am looking for any help to fix the problem.
 
signage

signage

New Member
You may be able to get an external drive case for 2.5" drives and put the drive in it and connect it to another computer via the USB cable and read the drive!
 
SignBurst PCs

SignBurst PCs

New Member
What makes you think it is a failing hard drive?

It sounds more like a software issue to me (although diagnosing over the Internet with such little info is sketchy at best). Virus, spyware, etc. may be a cause, but there are other possibilities as well.

If you want to get the files off, I would remove the drive and put it into an external 2.5" enclosure or a USB adapter for 2.5" drives and connect it to another computer. That sound like the easiest (and least expensive) way to me.
 
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rcook99

New Member
Casey i appreciate your advise and will look at giving that a try. As to why I think its the drive is only because I can not hear it spin up when trying to open a program. It won't do anything when I click on any files or folders. Is it ok to try to shut it down and restart it maybe that will allow me to move files and then replace the drive and reload software. I even tried deleting desktop icons and got an error not enough memory. I know there is at least 50% of free space on the drive itself. I have tried to right click on things, Ctrl, alt, del and nothing happens.
 
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rcook99

New Member
I turned it off and back on and it is letting me download files to a flash drive. I am in the middle of moving pics and files to a seperate folder and scanning them for viruses before I move them to the new computer.
 
R

rcook99

New Member
It still doesn't sound like a hard drive failure to me. I am thinking some malware of some sort.
Click to expand...

Casey, thanks for the help! Should I try another software to search for the malware?
 
SignBurst PCs

SignBurst PCs

New Member
If you are not picking anything up on the scans, you could try a third software, just to be safe.

I guess that you could also be running into some Windows issue. If that is the case, you could attempt a system restore back to a date that you weren't having problems.

Please know that I am "shooting from the hip" here as I running on very little info.

You may very well want to consider the assistance of a local computer tech.
 
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rcook99

New Member
download ad-aware for free... run that and spy bot(which you said you have) alternately until you get a complete bill of health from both programs. If you still have problems, I would take it in to see someone...
Click to expand...

I am in the process of doing that know, and I have downloaded all the files to a new folder that has been scanned.
 
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