Dell Bad boot device HD problem

97catintenn

97catintenn

New Member
Dell Bad boot device HD problem, New Problem

my laptop is:

Inspiron 1150

What's it mean when your laptop powers up but gives an error that reads
Hard disk read failure
No bootable devices...

and then waits for me to do something? Which I did. I got out my xp home cd and reformatted the harddrive, installed xp home again, and it went thru the most of the writting successfully. It reconized my 30gig HD and partitioned it, also installed windows on it for some 30mins... and then we comes time to restart, it claims HD Failure again.

I'm pretty sure my HD is okay, and now I'm leaning toward the bios. If I knew which bios to download and flash with I could try that, but I dont. Dell needs a stupid number off the bottom of the laptop to figure out what system i have, and those numbers are completely worn off.

What do you guys think the problem is? Am I waay off track here or what? Anybody know of a one size bios that fixes all dell inspirons?
 
Last edited:
97catintenn said:
Anybody know of a one size bios that fixes all dell inspirons?
Click to expand...

There won't be a Uni-BIOS becuase that would mean every motherboard they use would have to be the same. Each BIOS is different for each motherboard. Atleast, that's my understanding of it.
 
Rambo said:
There won't be a Uni-BIOS becuase that would mean every motherboard they use would have to be the same. Each BIOS is different for each motherboard. Atleast, that's my understanding of it.
Click to expand...


Well, when I went to update my ATI video card, it seemed like they one bois (catalyst) for all their cards.

Now, I didn't mean to say that one bios would work with different manufactors of mobo's, just that with the inspiron laptop, hopefully they pretty much all used the same mobo and there is a uni bios for all of them.
 
All you need is the model number for a bios update. You've already stated that you've got an Inspiron 1150. I would also check that your current bios can recognise your HD, and your HD is set up as the primary boot device.
 
LaptopExtreme said:
All you need is the model number for a bios update. You've already stated that you've got an Inspiron 1150. I would also check that your current bios can recognise your HD, and your HD is set up as the primary boot device.
Click to expand...

Do you have a link to where I go with the model number for a bios update? Dell.com wants more info.

As for the current bios recongizing the HD, I think that's the problem.

and Yes the HD is the primary boot device, well second to the floppy.
 
97catintenn said:
Do you have a link to where I go with the model number for a bios update? Dell.com wants more info.

As for the current bios recongizing the HD, I think that's the problem.

and Yes the HD is the primary boot device, well second to the floppy.
Click to expand...


Okay, I just powered it up to see what the bios would tell me about the HD, and the laptop started loading windows from the HD.

Weird. I'll let you guys now how long it lasts.
 
got all the drivers installed, thanks again for the link.

at least now it runs, but it is soo slow! I just finished doing a fresh install of XP and then all the drivers. No extra programs are on there yet, and it takes forever for the start button menu to come up, and then other menus.

Surfing the net is like an old computer on dailup. Which is weird because I downloaded the drivers at 100-120kps. It's just after you type in the page you want to go to, there is a delay.

So it's more than just an HD running at 2200rpms, it's the processer, ram, and the North Bridge.

I still haven't flashed the bios yet. I doubt I can get to the battery to remove it anyway, if thats needed.
 
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