Dell says my HD is broken- true/false?

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Ken - Sep 22, 2009 at 12:34 PM
 Blocked Profile - Sep 22, 2009 at 02:20 PM
Hello, I dropped my laptop yesterday and the computer seemed to be working fine until about 20 minutes later, when I went back to check on it. The screen was black and the start-up screen (where it says "Dell" and there's a little loading bar at the bottom) kept showing up as if the system was working and then it would freeze at a black screen and the fan would make a whirring noise before showing the starting up screen again- about every 2 minutes. Of course I call Dell's tech support, who tells me that the HD is broken. Now, I'm not sure if the dude was taking advantage of the fact that I'm no comp. expert at ALL, but I had to order a new HD for 200 bucks. I started researching all of this info today when I had internet access in front of me, is there any way to check to see if my HD will ever work again? There are NO cracks on my computer, no apparent physical damage. Last night when I talked to the tech support guy, he made me run a few diagnostic tests on my laptop which had error messages saying "Could not read/write disk" or something. In the most simplistic terms possible, can anyone give me advice on how to check if my files can be saved/extracted from the HD? Thanks.
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2 responses

xpcman Posts 19528 Registration date Wednesday October 8, 2008 Status Contributor Last seen June 15, 2019 1,824
Sep 22, 2009 at 02:08 PM
If you ran the Dell diagnostics and it found a hard disk error - I would trust Dell. The problem with getting a hard disk from Dell is that it will not come with Windows installed. I hope you ordered the laptop with the optional Windows disk. You might be able to beat that price at a local repair shop and they might be able to use their OEM copy of Windows and your COA serial number to install Windows.

If you have a standard 2.5 inch laptop drive you can try purchasing a external drive adapter (cost under $25). You plug the OLD drive into the external adapter and connect the USB cable to your computer. Some small Dell laptops (like my D420) use a 1.8 inch drive (same as the Ipod). I haven't found a external adapter that works with 1.8 inch drives.

The problem is that drives are sensitive to SHOCK. If the computer was operating when it fell the read/write heads will have bounced off the disk surface. The PC may continue to work until it needs to read or write data to the disk. If the damage was to the I/O heads you can't recover any data. If the damage was to a critical Windows file, on the disk surface, then you should be able to recover most of your data. My guess is that you will not be able to recover anything.

Good Luck
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Blocked Profile
Sep 22, 2009 at 02:20 PM
Look sir,

you dropped your laptop!! there must be a problem now with your screen!!!

i will advise you to take the laptop to be checked by some technician

Thank you
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