Windows Vista not booting and ask 'proper boot device'

Hi All

This is a very sudden happening...

Laptop is quite new, bought in May 08. Using Vista Premium.

I was browsing few sites fine, then I came across b, a government economy site. It gave a Google site warning that it is blocked and not recommended to visit. But I accidentally clicked go in anyway, but closed the page before the page can load. Don't know if that has any impact.

So I left my laptop, and went out of my office for 1-2 hours or so. The next time I came back to my laptop, this is what I see:

"Reboot and select proper boot device or insert boot media in selected boot device"

So does that has to do with a trojan attack or whatever? Or harddisk / windows prob?

Please help. I have a lot of important work files inside there, and I really have to get it back.

Laptop spec:
Asus F8S
Duo T8100

Google site warning:
http://www.depkeu.go.id
StopBadware.org Report for www.depkeu.go.id/

I can find nothing wrong with that web site and it is very doubtful that any web site could cause that error.

The error indicates that your BIOS can not find a boot device or hard drive.

Asus here:

ASUSTeK Computer Inc.-Support-

Do you have a recovery DVD or do you know if the computer has a hotkey for recovery options?

I believe Asus has a recovery CD. I am going to check.
Does recovery removes my documents and all?

Here's google's site warning on the site:
Google Safe Browsing diagnostic page for www.depkeu.go.id/

In order for any internet site to cause your error would mean a boot sector virus and this is like a one in a million shot.

Anyway what happens when you try to boot?

If you cannot even boot into Safe Mode you will need either the DVD or else a hotkey for Recovery e.g. F10 or F11 etc.

I cannot find an English manual for that particular laptop.

There is usually a choice of Repair Install and Factory (Clean) Install.

The former saves data the latter does not.

This is what happens when I try to boot:
"Reboot and select proper boot device or insert boot media in selected boot device"

I tried F8 and no good. Not sure if there's a F10 or F11 hotkey for recovery...

Will be going to work now... trying the few recovery cd and stuff. Will let you know more...

Try the F keys. One might work.

Otherwise look for your DVD (assuming the laptop came with one).

In a worse case scenario you can either put that hard drive in a external case or a desktop computer using an adapter in order to extract the old data.

You can also create and attempt to boot a Live CD such as UBUNTU which again should give you access to your old data.

Ubuntu Home Page | Ubuntu

Thanks for the assistance so far. Here's an update.

I checked Asus Recovery CD. No repair option. They will wipe out entire hard disk and restore to original state. So that is no go. I need to check the notebook hard disk with an external USB adaptor on another PC.

One weird thing...

I checked the BIOS and no hard disk is detected. Only the DVD drive is detected. I tried using Hiren's bootcd and they scanned to hard disk. So could it be that my hard drive is dead? Well, considering that it was working just fine, the laptop is still on and probably going into screen saver state. A little weird for it to just "die" in 1 hour's time.

I am downloading Ubuntu. But don't think it will do anything much to help.

I have yet to test the hard drive to a external casing. I can't lose those work documents.

If the BIOS does not detect the drive no software will.

Have you tried removing it and replacing it?

Perhaps it is simply a connection issue.

As to hardware death it is quite similar to the natural kind. Usually there are prior symptoms but it can also be quite sudden.

I took the hard drive out and connecting it to a external USB casing. It detects a "USB Mass Storage Device" but does not appear in Computer Management nor in My Computer as a new drive.

There seems to be a rough spinning ....

This is my earlier problem:
http://www.d-a-l.com/help/windows-vi...oting-ask.html

Came back from somewhere and I found my laptop not booting.

Bios does not detect hard drive. I took out the drive and plug into an external USB casing. It detected a "USB Mass Storage Device". But does not appear in Computer Management nor My Computer as a new drive. If I put my ear to the drive, I can hear a faint sound, not really spinning but some light humming.

Please help. I really need to get the work data out of that hard drive. The laptop is almost new only bought in May 08.