Hard drive failure

I have an older HP 523n desktop that I'm trying to fix for a friend. When I got it, I noticed that it was making a "clicking" sound on startup....which I assumed to be the hard drive. He said it had been doing that since he bought it in 2001. The problem he was having was that it took forever to boot up and get online. I did a virus scan (there was no antivirus on the machine) and found it loaded with malware. I cleaned all of that off the computer and got it to the point that it loaded fairly normally. However, when I tried to install the anti-virus, I could not access any anti virus site to do a download. Turns out that there was still the w32/virut bug in the system. When I finally got that cleaned out, the computer would no longer boot up. When going to Safe Mode, it would display the safe mode options and after selecting one and clicking enter, it would drop out of safe mode and try to load windows. It would go to the Administrator logon screen, but when clicking logon, it would then go to a shut down screen. At any rate, I cannot get into either Safe Mode or do a complete boot up to Windows.

My question is this....keeping in mind the clicking noise at startup, would it be simpler to replace the hard drive? This HP does not come with recovery disks, but stores the recovery function on the D drive. I tried to do a system recovery (before I did any of the cleaning mentioned above), but it went to a fatal error screen, which leads me to believe that the hard drive is failing. If I replace the hard drive, can I use the recovery disks from another computer I have (Sony Vaio with XP Home), or do I need to go another route? Any help/adice is appreciated. By the way, I don't have any computer repair expertise, but am not afraid to try to do what's necessary. Thanks again.

A hard drive clicking sound is bad so that could be the problem or it could be the malware and if you can't access the recovery files it could be that perhaps some how the malware is blocking that or the drive is really screwed up. I don't know if malware can damage a recovery partition. Does he have any important data on the drive? If so you might need to risk putting the drive into another computer and doing file recovery. Perhaps while you are at it you can try to fix the malware on that drive. First though I would backup the files on whatever computer you connect it to onto an external drive & disconnect that from your computer until you have done the file recovery (if you can), fixed the malware problem on your friend's drive if you decide to do that, & then worked with one of our experts to make sure that your drive is clean. Since the recovery partition is messed up I really don't know how to help you because I don't have enough training on malware so I'm not allowed to help with that. What I do know is that you can't use the recovery disks from your Sony on your friend's HP. For one that is illegal & in addition those sony disks are designed for sony computers ONLY. They are literally locked out from being used on any other computer. So if you wanted to go with the drive replacement strategy your friend would also have to obtain a legal copy of XP; we can only provide support & acquisition of legal copies. What your friend can do is to get an OEM version of xp for $90 (home) or $140 (pro). He will just need to decide if restoring the computer is worth buying both a hard drive and a copy of windows or if he would rather put that money towards a new computer. Perhaps one of our malware experts will chime in.

Thanks for the reply townsbg. Appreciate the heads up on the illegal aspects...something I didn't think of. I know my friend doesn't want to invest a lot of $$ to get this working, as he only intended to let his granddaughter use it when she visits. After reading your reply, I did some searching and have found a hard drive (from a family member) in a similar year HP that has been erased and was working ok when last used. I've also contacted my friend to have him contact HP to see if he can get a copy of his recovery disks. If none of this works, I've told him that if he wants to have a spare computer for his granddaughter's visits, it might make more since to invest in a low end computer rather than to spend the extra $$ for a new hard drive and a copy of XP. Again, thanks for your input.

If I remember right I contacted HP about disks for a compaq that I was given but that didn't come with the disks & I was told that since Vista came out they don't provide disks anymore. You shouldn't have to get an HP drive. I recommend seagate or western digital but with a purchase of XP (even an OEM license) & a hard drive he's looking at at least $150. Thats not something I would do for an extra computer. As for correcting the problem, I don't know enough about Malware to offer advice and here I am not allowed to; I can't even tell you if you do have malware. Now when it boots up & you try to log in does it do a regular shutdown or does it crash? You could have a combination of a few problems.

Hi ,

A simple little HD benchmark app for use on suspect failing HD's is HDTach - The trial version of HD Tach measures the sequential read speed (at various points on the device), the random access speed, interface burst speed and CPU utilization of the drive. The registered version adds sequential write testing.

Free download link : HdTach

Well, now nothing happens except the hd clicking loudly....no boot up at all. I'm pretty convinced that the hd is toast. As said, he doesn't want to spend the $$ for a new hd and os, just so his granddaughter can use it a couple of weekends per month. He said he would rather buy a low end computer.....but may just have the granddaughter do without, since he's not going to let her have access to his new computer. Thanks again for the input.

Thanks, I'll check it out.

clicking sound is really bad.
try your recovery console and issue command chckdsk /r this will scan and to recover file in your haraddrive if found in a bad sector.

After above I guess you're not yet finish because of some other virus in the harddrive. I remember having same issue (log on then reboot) that is a virus, I just dont remember it. malwarebytes and avast will help you deal with it..

good luck, I hope it helps

inapaler,

Thanks for the reply, however I can't even get to a command prompt as the logon process is in a loop from logon to logoff. Going to Safe Mode and selecting Command Prompt only makes it go to the logoff sequence. Seems as though I'm out of options to repair/recover witht the existing hd.

Sorry, bad advice. Removed.

You don't want to use your drive any more since it it's already failing, continuing to use it will only make matters worse.

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Rich

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