My laptop seems to have kicked the bucket...

HannahIOW

Hiya, just wanting to pick a few brains on this really...

My laptop seems well and truly bu@@ered as of last night (I'm using OH's one at the mo). Windows loads up fine, but try and do anything once it's loaded and it just won't let you. Firefox won't load up, messenger either won't load up, or it will and then won't close. Everything says 'not responding' and the hard drive light is staying permanently on.

Spoke to a techie friend last night who advised me to go into safe mode and do a system restore, which I did and it made no difference at all. Hard drive light staying on all the time. He has offered to take a look at it next week sometime (eek I am lost without my laptop), I can't even get it to behave long enough to get my documents and saved web sites off it.

So basically, any ideas? Could it be something replaceable like a knackered hard drive? I've had it around 2 years, I am planning to buy a 'nice' laptop to do my photography course on, and wanted to have this one purely for internet use. Really hoping I don't have to replace it as cannot afford to be buying two laptops, took me ages to save up for my 'nice' one. End of the day I have to have two laptops.

Thanks in advance

davb

When you start in safe mode does it work ok - if so, it could bea virus/malware problem

davester

The fact windows is booting up and then it all goes wrong points to a virus or malware.

aliEnRIK

Go into safe mode WITH NETWORKING then ~

Download MALWAREBYTES (Make sure you click 'DOWNLOAD LATEST VERSION')
http://www.filehippo.com/download_malwarebytes_anti_malware/
Open malwarebytes and goto UPDATE and click 'check for updates'. After its updated goto SCANNER and click PERFORM FULL SCAN then click SCAN
Post the log COMPLETE here AFTER youve deleted everything it finds



Download HIJACK THIS (Make sure you click 'DOWNLOAD LATEST VERSION')
http://www.filehippo.com/download_hijackthis/
Click MAIN MENU then DO A SYSTEM SCAN AND SAVE A LOGFILE(Takes seconds) then post the log so we can see whats running
(do NOT do anything else with Hijack but scan and post the FULL log)

HannahIOW

Thanks for replies no it does the exact same thing when in safe mode but will try my best to do what has been suggested if it will let me get that far

gonzo127

usual suggestion from me download and burn of ubuntu, set to boot from cd/dvd drive first and when ubuntu 'install' screen comes up click to run in live cd mode see if this allows you to run normally and try some 'intensive' useage of your hard drive, such as playing a movie or music where it has to access the hard drive for information, if it does everything else like going on the internet and such but freezes up when accessing movies or music it is more than likely are hard drive failure, if everything works it will more than likely be a windows problem

HannahIOW

Ok thanks will see if I am able to do that. If it really can't be fixed I have just spotted a little Dell netbook online for only £149 so not breaking the bank excessively, I thought they were much more expensive than that!

Taffybiker

No need to waste your money. The problems with your laptop are almost certainly software related - and that can always be fixed.

phxweb

if you can get into Safe Mode hit ctrl alt del

Sort the list by CPU if anything is constantly using 60-100% cpu time please post it back here

steven_garner

Start -> Run -> Type "CHKDSK/R" Press "Y" when indicated and re-boot.

This will scan your HDD (Takes about 1-2 hours) Make sure Data is in correct place and the data is not on bad sectors.

HannahIOW

Thing is I've had problems with that laptop from the start - it was a refurbished one. The delete key doesn't work but I did manage to get into task manager for a few seconds and the CPU usage was at 99%, then gradually went down to 3%.

With regards to running check disc, how will I know if data is on bad sectors? Will it say so? I'm not even sure the laptop's going to let me run it to be honest.