computer troubles

[jaala]

My laptop won't start Windows, even in safe mode. My bootable Ubuntu CD doesn't work either. A linear check of the hard drive in PC-Doctor (DOS) failed. All I was doing before it crashed was drag-and-dropping an RSS feed in Thunderbird. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to do any backups since before the summer, due to my CD burner being buried in the basement; that's a lot of data, including many photos, that I'll lose if it can't be recovered.

Feh.

Comments

[bangdrum.livejournal.com]

I'm going to take a guess (based on experience) and tell you that your hard drive's dead. Cause I had roughly the same thing (no Windows, safe mode, backup mode, whatever, didn't work) and 50 gigs worth of lost video clips. It does suck.

Can you call your local tech support people (either Dell or whoever made the PC, or Best Buy/CompUSA/etc)? That's the best way to confirm whether it's hard drive death. If it is, you can install a new one (and then reinstall everything else, including Windows, drivers, etc). If it's something else, maybe you got lucky or maybe it's time for a new computer altogether.

Either way, hope you can figure it out (and if possible, save your stuff!). :)