what does this mean?

joeyfivecents · Post by **joeyfivecents** » Wed Feb 21, 2007 7:10 pm

So I go into my office at home the other night and there on my 3 year old Dell laptop's screen is the blue screen of death. Haven't seen it in ages. Tried to restart-did it again. Then I tried again later the next day and actually got it to start doing something. Another blue screen of death pops up. But this time it is different. The message was: unmountable boot drive. Does this mean I'm having the inevitable hd failure? Could it be a fan on the motherboard ? I heard something trying to spin and speeding up and slowing down. Any experiences with this and what should I do?

Tone Deft · Post by **Tone Deft** » Wed Feb 21, 2007 7:12 pm

Pop it open and check the cable connections, disconnect cables and reconnect them. It could also be the power supply, more likely cables.

nebulae · Post by **nebulae** » Wed Feb 21, 2007 7:57 pm

sounds like mobo failure

joeyfivecents · Post by **joeyfivecents** » Wed Feb 21, 2007 8:11 pm

nebulae wrote:sounds like mobo failure

that's what I was wondering. Sometimes a faulty fan on the motherboard can cause weird happenings. I relly don't want to take this thing to someone and have to pay a bunch of money. It's 3 years old! Help. How can I troubleshoot this thing?

nebulae · Post by **nebulae** » Wed Feb 21, 2007 8:13 pm

if mobo failure, not much you can do...if 3 years old, I'd say scrap and get a new one

pulsoc · Post by **pulsoc** » Wed Feb 21, 2007 11:55 pm

nebulae wrote:if mobo failure, not much you can do...if 3 years old, I'd say scrap and get a new one

Yeah, sadly it seems like 3 years is now the outer edge of built in obscelescensce. I spelled it that way because I don't remember where the 'sc' combo really goes.

kennerb · Post by **kennerb** » Thu Feb 22, 2007 12:16 am

It also might be the drive.

If you can go find an external case for it and see if you can mount it on another machine.

Then copy all your stuff so you have a back up.

When I see a machine blue screen then boot up then blue screen later it always seems to be that the drive is going bad.

nebulae · Post by **nebulae** » Thu Feb 22, 2007 12:19 am

agreed with ken, try a different drive in the box before throwing out the box

chapelier fou · Post by **chapelier fou** » Thu Feb 22, 2007 11:00 am

yep, it happened with mine too: the HD chipset on the motherboard.... You can try installing windows on an external HD if your bios is OK with it.