Hard drive failure?

pacman_2

got Sony Vaio laptop, about 8 months old. Used for surfing mostly. got Avast AV on it. yseterday got a Windows message saying 'hard drive failing. back up data and start recovery' tried to do this but it crashed and got black blank screen saying 'Operating System not found'.

Managed to get friend to look at it and he restored it to previous point but the message has come up again. Running a full scan (it's taking ages).

What should I do now?

Thanks for help.

rmg1

If it's working now, I'd run a full scan with MalWareBytes, fix anything it finds and post the log on here for someone to look at.
If the restore point worked, then I would guess it's a virus of some description rather than a physical failure.

Might be an idea to back up anyway (before and after the scan).

Leo2020

It's likely that your HDD has SMART: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S.M.A.R.T.

SMART monitors your HDD for failures. I would say if you getting an error message that your hard drive is failing and no OS could be found then it is very likely that the HDD is failing. You can always run a virus/malware scan just in case but if it was me I would be prioritising a back-up, unless you have your data backed up already.

pacman_2

Laptop mainly used for surfing. only data i need is photos and videos. i've backed these to external hard drive. Do I need to replace hard drive? Will this be covered by warranty?

Leo2020

It should be covered by your warranty if it a faulty HDD (which I am fairly confident it is). I would contact the retailer you bought it from, most likely they will either want to do some diagnostics over the phone or in store to make sure it is a hardware fault. They will then send it away for repair.

arriva

I suggest you save as much data as possible because when they send the machine back it is usually restored to "the beginning". Your data will be wiped as you get a fresh install.

If possible (if every now and then it starts at all), clone the hard disk (with Acronis for example) then when you get the computer back you can re-clone it onto the new hard disk so you won't lose a thing.

pacman_2

I ran full scan and removed all threats(all severe). thought that was that. But the message has come up again, so i guess it wasn't a virus but actual hard disk problem. does it physically need to be replaced or will they 'clean' it?

amcluesent

Needs a hard disk swap. Once they start to 'go' then there's every chance it'll just fail %100.

pacman_2

Pretty sure it's an actual failure. thought it might be a virus and others might have got the same message. It's under warranty so not to worry. Can I go to local Sony shop rather than to my online retailer, Play.com?

Leo2020

Not sure but I think you can take it to a Sony centre. You can certainly call Sony for support, they will probably collect it from you.

They can't clean a hard drive, only thing they would do to "clean" it is to do a system recovery if it was a software problem/viruses. That would wipe the HDD and put it back to factory settings. As the actual disk is failing it needs replacing.

texranger

if it is a HDD failure then they would replace this anyway, so you would have nothing on it, so backup your HDD so you have any mission critical files you need