Hard Drive Failure

[ajdude08]

Yesterday, I restarted my Dell Inspiron 1545 laptop and found that I could not log back once it booted up. It just froze after I entered my password.

So, I shut it down with the power button and tried booting in safe mode, which did not work either. Finally, I ran the startup repair. This took about 2 hours, but in the end I was able to log in. However, this was short lived, and as soon as I opened up Halo, the computer crashed to a blue screen and said "hard drive disk not detected".

Thankfully, it is still under warranty, so Dell is sending another hard drive. My question is, what exactly does the hard drive do? If it is replaced, will my laptop basically run like a completely new computer? Also, is there any way to retrieve the data that is in the old hard drive?

 

[jamesd1981]

do you have a windows disc, obviously if they are just sending you a new hard drive which is strange if it is under warranty, it will obviously be blank, so you will either need a windows disc or you will have to ghost your old hard drive to the new one

 

[voyagerfan99]

do you have a windows disc, obviously if they are just sending you a new hard drive which is strange if it is under warranty, it will obviously be blank, so you will either need a windows disc or you will have to ghost your old hard drive to the new one

It's a 50/50. Sometimes it's loaded, and sometimes it's not.

 

[ajdude08]

do you have a windows disc, obviously if they are just sending you a new hard drive which is strange if it is under warranty, it will obviously be blank, so you will either need a windows disc or you will have to ghost your old hard drive to the new one

I do have a windows disc, but I think they said it would come with windows installed. However, will my computer now be like a new computer? Id getting a new hard drive like a clean slate?

 

[voyagerfan99]

I do have a windows disc, but I think they said it would come with windows installed. However, will my computer now be like a new computer? Id getting a new hard drive like a clean slate?

Yes when you get your drive it will come with only Windows loaded on it and maybe a dell utility or two. You'll have to reinstall your programs back onto the computer.

If the drive is not imaged and you have to install Windows, you will also have to install the drivers to get the hardware to work correctly. You should also have a disc for that. If not you can download the drivers off Dell's support website.

If you have documents, pics, music, etc that you need to recover, you can get one of these adapters to transfer your stuff over.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16812232002