Wife's laptop shows the "Blue Screen of Death" (1 Viewer)

My wife's laptop was purchased a little over three (3) years ago. Is it ready for the "scrape heap"? I have run the diagnostics and get the message, "Replace the hard drive". Is there anything else I can try like re-formatting the hard drive or do we just go out and buy a new laptop? I am not certain if trying to have the hard drive replaced is an option to consider or not.

Oh, our washing machine just quit too! We are having a new one delivered tomorrow!

What's next?

Feeling a little frustrated!

Hard drives are cheap. If you were happy with the laptop then a replacement hard drive would be the way to go. For extra $ you could pop in a solid state drive for a performance boost. I generally recommend a 3 year life for computers and similar devices (ipods, ipads etc) so a new machine is also a valid option.

You just need to verify that the hard drive has really failed and that it is not something else - motherboard for instance.

Cheers
Steve

You can first run the basis Chkdsk disk check program built into Windows, it will give you a disk check and diagnostics that are a bit more specific.
You can of course get more extensive service utilities and diagnostic programs such
Iolo System Mechanic or hardware detailing programs such as Piriform Speccy or Belarc Advisor to help get the details of the configuration and narrow down what is off, assuming you can still load anything into the machine.

If the conclusion is that it is really a drive problem, I'd strongly endorse SteveClark's recommendation to replace the drive with a solid state unit. Her laptop will be reborn enormously improved and unless she needs more than 500 gigs, it will cost less than a dollar a gig.
Do note that the there is no universal standard for laptop drives. Although the SSD is usually small enough to fit anywhere, jury rigged at a pinch, it is a lot better to have a compatible replacement.

Hi Larry, if the maker's diags say the drive needs replacing, I'd replace it (you can test it fully once any vital data is saved elsewhere, and if a full SMART test and full format followed by a Windows chkdsk all come up clean, the drive may still be useful as a backup - you can never have too many backups)!

I'll agree with the SSD upgrade/drive swap too, it'll give a big reduction in startup/shutdown times, program loading, etc.

As for capacity/model, many users would be fine with 128GB but it really depends on personal usage, the best drives from the reliability viewpoint are from Intel, Crucial, Samsung and (probably, too early to be sure) Plextor. Many come with full instructions, software and USB connectors that enable cloning ready for swap out in ~15 - 20 minutes. The actual swap should take ~10 minutes, it consists mostly of undoing about 6 screws.

In your position, cloning may not be the best idea, any existing drive/data errors will be carried over to the SSD, better to install afresh and use the USB connectors to attach the old drive and copy the user data back over once Windows is installed on the SSD.

Do you have the Windows Recovery/Restore discs, or can you create them from the program on your drive from the maker (HP/Compaq, Dell, etc.)?

I am looking at this on my five year old laptop which recently had an SSD drive installed and a new high capacity battery, all of which were still much cheaper than buying a new machine. The outcome is that it is far quicker to start up and use (about ten seconds) than it was when new. Also the battery now lasts about six hours. if you can find a proficient computer technician locally who can upgrade to an SSD drive and reload your data on it it is the biggest improvement you can make to any computer in my opinion.:t:

Thanks guys, we are still considering our options.

I just bought a new computer ,second day of using ,blue screen started???:eek!:
Kept it though ,had my chance to bring it back within 14 days.

borealowl47 said:

I just bought a new computer ,second day of using ,blue screen started???:eek!:
Kept it though ,had my chance to bring it back within 14 days.

Click to expand...

Darrell, I assume you are taking it back then and either get a different one or get your money back, right?

what did you end up doing larry?

The problem was likely caused by missing drivers which are preventing the laptop booting rather than any hardware issues.

One thing you could try is to remove all of your memory cards but one and remove your DVD drive from the laptop and rebooting. Both bad memory and a faulty DVD drive can prevent a computing from POST or booting to Windows.

I would recommend the opposite of everyone else and suggest strongly that you buy a new laptop rather than mucking about installing a new hard drive formatting and installing Windows then install all your hardware drivers and then all the software you usually use together with configuring it all how you want it then sorting out your printer drivers and software scanner etc and Wi-Fi settings .......

I think you get the picture.

I've been repairing and rebuilding laptops for 8x years and can tell you from experience that if every single bit of software and drivers you install on your new hard drive works properly the first time without any issues and all your hardware also works first time you are still looking at possibly 8+ hours work to get back to where you started .:-C

One thing you could have tried is to boot in 'SAFE' mode and try 'RESTORE' back to a previous date when your laptop worked perfectly.
There are various ways of achieving this and you may need expert help to do it properly. Plus you can salvage your Wife's files by connecting the hard drive to another laptop or PC using a USB PATA/SATA cable adapter . They are only a few dollars

Thank you all for your comments. They are appreciated. * earleybird I have put the matter on hold for the time being as I have had quite a few "irons in the fire" recently. My wife and I are both using my laptop currently. I think we will probably end up just investing in a new laptop for her.

Thanks again guys!

Another suggestion which I discovered a while back

You can ask a PC expert/friend to connect a spare hard-drive/motherboard to your 'defunct' hard-drive/motherboard, and access your files via the hard-drive, rather than through the monitor screen.

Then any files that are not backed up, can be downloaded onto your new hard-drive. You can have all your e-mails downloaded in this manner onto your new hard-drive. Just handy to keep information together.

I am sure not many of us keep backups of our e-mails as it is the last thing on our minds.

My last PC died a death after a blue screen appeared and remained until i replaced it, so that was the end of it.

Our current PC is showing signs of giving up, and it is 5 years old now. and is needing replaced now too! Just that way things go I guess

Regards
Kathy
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