Hello, After a few months of sitting on this issue, assuming it has been beyond my repair (not to keen on notebook repair, mostly desktops). I run a Dell Diagnostics utility that is a part of the bootup sequence on the laptop itself. Every test passes, except one, this is the message I receive: "DST Short Status Test Test Results: Fail Error Code: 1000-0142 Msg: Unit 4:Drive Self Test failed. Status byte = 70." I've been unable to install an operating system on the machine and I've run it through so many tests and tried so many things, but the above information is the latest and I think most informative. If anyone knows where I would be able to get more information about this, or knows what is wrong with it themselves. Please let me know. Thank you very much in advance.

Sounds like a bad hard drive. Look here http://www.dellcommunity.com/suppor... Keep Smiling It makes them think you're up to something...

It does sound like a drive problem. Considering you were using the CD drive to run the testing it sounds like the harddrive. If you know what brand HDrive is inside you could DLoad a drive fitness test from the manufacturer. Ultimate Boot CD also has the drive diagnostics on the CD but I don't know if it would ID the brand of drive. How does the drive show in the BIOS and POST screens?