Computer guru needed

Steve :

Google finds about 83,500 results. It might be worth reading a few if you haven't done so already.

A disc scan and repair may well fix it. You can boot from the W7 DVD to get at the recovery tools - the first thing it will try is a chkdsk...

Also check he has not tweaked any setings in the BIOS.

Hence the need for help from someone more experienced than I in order to hopefully narrow the field down a bit.

How would we know where the problem is? Could be various things, bad hdd, bad mobo, bad battery contacts, bad battery, bios set wrong by mistake, loose lead, screw fell onto conductors, etc. Troubleshoot it then you'll know.

NT

Thank you John

Check obvious things like loose leads/cards etc. Maybe the tranport = loosened something.

Tim

In article , Steve writes

uk.comp.homebuilt

This is their specialist area so they will be better able to help.

Cable came loose on the way back and has now moved enough to matter.

Has he unwittedly plugged in a USB hard drive, and it's now attempting to boot from that? Those things have become the replacement for 'have ye left a floppy disc in it' curse.

Thanks very much Tim, fred, Bob and Adrian C - fingers crossed it is indeed something so easy to fettle.

SATA cables commonly shake loose,

If you install a lovely new drive, switch on and, at more or less the same moment, drop a screwdriver several inches onto the uncovered drive (because you have not yet refitted the cover) it does that.

En el artículo , Steve escribió:

Yes, you made the mistake of fixing a pc for a friend/family member. It's now broken again and it'll be your fault, and you'll be expected to provide free lifetime support for it.

fairly likely (just make sure first he hasn't left a disk in the floppy or optical drive, or a USB stick, or a memory card)

grit teeth, install new hard disk, start again

Plead sudden illness. Change your phone number.

Ain't that the truth. BTDTGTTS. I now try to plead ignorance.

Tim

In message , Steve writes

Is it trying to boot from the correct device?

Good point - it's not trying to boot from the DVD drive by mistake? But I imagine you're smarter than that and it will be the connections shoaking loose on the trip home.

Paul DS

This seems like the most likely diagnosis to me. When installing from DVD, boot order in BIOS may have been set to look at DVD drive before HD. If the friend has left a non-bootable DVD in the drive . . .

As it's SATA first thing I'd check is the connection to the HD .. I really dislike the connectors, not robust at all, IME.

Try booting into BIOS and see if the hd is seen correctly before trying a complete re-boot to windows.

You win the prize Adrian as you were the first to mention it. Just before I got to his house today he discovered that if he left a USB flash drive connected nothing happened and the computer booted normally. However, if he left his 250GB Seagate external hard drive connected to the USB port the BIOS looked to boot from that first and it failed.

Went into BIOS and disabled booting from the Seagate external drive and all is once again good with the world - until next time :-)