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Name: XpUser
I just got off the phone talking with a tech at Best Buy. I made this call at the request of my friend, John. John has been frustrated at not being able to use his HP Media Center DVD writer and CD-ROM. Here is a short transcript of my conversation:
Best Buy: We've run the disgnostic on John's PC and he has a bad HD.
XpUser: Is the reason why he could not access his drives due to a bad HD? Windows seems to have loaded normally before John bought it in and while at Best Buy it loads normally.
Best Buy: Even though Windows may open and load normally the bad HD can stop anything from working normally at any time.
XpUser: OK. Once the HD is replaced will he be able to use the DVD and CDROM drives?
Best Buy: Once it is replaced the PC should be just like it was brand new and everything should work.
XpUser: How did you determined the problem was the HD going bad?
Best Buy: We have a special test that tests the HD for several hours and it detects any fluxuation in the HD.
Your comments, please.
TIA
i_XpUser
I HAVE loaded bad hard drives.. I play with em. I have some very old utilities that write zeros to anything.. and have been able to fix every hard drive doing this except one.
A bad hard drive could mean a few things but he is suggesting if it has bad spots and those spots have the drivers necessary for teh DVD drive, then the OS cant read the drivers necessary.
* chuckles* I have run into allot of tecks that automatically chalk up problems to bad hardware when actually it was a registry entry screwing things up.
What would I do>?
devices/remove the dvd player
I would unload all drivers and programs to do with it..
control panal/add/remove programs for any media
any programs specific to the DVD player.
Run WinDoctor to clean up and left over stuff.
COLD BOOT
( yes, even in winxp a cold boot is different from a reboot)
and then re install the media programs and stuff.another easy solution might be to grab him a smaller hard drive, install it as primary (keeping his big drive as storage)
I had a teck INSIST that I needed a new motherboard ( way back when) when it refused to pick up my USB cam after trying a ton of stuff. I knew I had been hacked and that was when the trouble started.. so I was stubborn and eventually found a bad registry entry in regards to my usb that was loading up with every reformat. I killed it and it never came back.
You know what ?
Alot of Computer students learn allot of stuff and then come home and hack peoples computers for experiance and kicks.A computer is a perfectionist's nightmare.
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Skeptical. Optical drives should have nothing to do with hard drives. (I'm assuming HD means Hard drive/disk, I'm not a abbreviation person). It is your BIOS's job to detect optical drives in just every computer. The only thing I can think of is that the drive's driver may be located in a bad sector. If that's the case, do a disk scan, fix the bad sectors. You may have to reinstalled the drivers if that happens.
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Have him disconnect one of the optical drives and see if the system will detect the other drive. Then try the same with the other drive. If both are detected when they are by themselves, have him split up the optical drives on different cables. Windows sometimes has problems with certain motherboards and optical drives on the same channel.
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Hi XpUser. Run CHKDSK /R from the recovery console. That should isolate any bad sectors. Google to drive finess test from Hitachi and run it. Do a hijackthis log at the site. You know what I mean. Also uninstall all the optical drives and let xp reinstall. Next post will be the registry fix for the drives.
Please post back within 24 hours or I will delete the post from my follow up list. Thanks. It would be a courtesy if you would post back and let us know if the fix worked or not.
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Possible reg fix. Good luck bud.-------Create a Restore point and back up the registry.Open regedit.
Look for;HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\system\CurrentControlSet\SetControlClass.
Key name: {4D36E965-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318}
Value Data:[Delete all value data from upper and lower filters]
Note-Do not delete the key or the multi-string values. Delete only the data values.
Exit regedit and reboot.Please post back within 24 hours or I will delete the post from my follow up list. Thanks. It would be a courtesy if you would post back and let us know if the fix worked or not.
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Hi Everyone - thanks for your thoughts. I have convinced John to take the PC out of Best Buy, call HP and order the Restore CD kit (he never made one - don't ask me why) and then I will take care of it myself when he comes down to NYC.
i_XpUser
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Smart move XpUser. The fixes I gave you could be done with a talk through on the phone.
Please post back within 24 hours or I will delete the post from my follow up list. Thanks. It would be a courtesy if you would post back and let us know if the fix worked or not.
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There's something else that John didn't tell me. Best Buy mentioned that he have consented to a PC dust clean-out for $30 plus taxes. When I asked them why $30 when he could do it for $1.99 using a compressed air can, they tried to tell me that it will do more damage than good and that they have the special kind of equipment to do it. Heck no way do I believe them!
i_XpUser
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LOL!! Special equipment is a $1 can. They get a discount. Just remember, those people are not there to give advice they are there to make money, not friends.
Please post back within 24 hours or I will delete the post from my follow up list. Thanks. It would be a courtesy if you would post back and let us know if the fix worked or not.
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