dead HDD well dying but will be dead soon

[Highlander]

i have win xp pro on my main pc, and would like to stay on xp till support finishes (which i think is this year lol)

anyways, i had a massive gaming tower and and it was ugly, so i bought a new tower and psu on 27th Dec, fitted all goodies together and nice smaller compact fit on desk and no probs.....till yesterday, it wouldnt boot up

i took it back to Aria, and it was a dead PSU, swapped, now working again.

BUT, after playing about with chkdsk it has killed my hdd i think (ok, i think it was already dying) as it takes 10 mins to do post boot screen, then i get either a reboot of blue chkdsk page or starts to load xp, just depends on what it wants to do

then if i let it do chkdsk, it takes hours to complete, but if it decides to run xp, i get egg timer n screen for an hour, then loading page for 20 mins, then background page on screen appears but no icons, and after 1 hr, teh lower task bar shows, but empty only clock in right corner, then 2 hrs later icons start to appear, but can't open or click on them

is this a sign of failing HDD?

and now my next question, i have never, and i mean NEVER backed up a hdd, so how easy is it, and how do i transfer all data from failing ide drive to a new sata drive?

thanks in advance

p.s. i am typing this on my lappy as pc has a few more hours to go till it fully boots i think lol

 

[little_pob]

If there is no important data on there I'd do a fresh install, followed by a SMART test using Seagate's SeaTools or those of the drive's manufacturer.

If there is data on there you want to keep, grab a live disc such as BartPE or the Windows version of Hiren's so that you aren't having to wait for the boot issue you've got. Once your data is backed up, try a repair or fresh install.

 

[Highlander]

my life is on that hdd m8, i need everything off it.

been talking to Purity on fb, i think he will be coming the rescue once again for me over the next week(ish)

i've got hirens, but ony ever used memtest on it, dont know what all other progs do lol

 

[nistleboy]

I have the latest dvd of hirens which might help.I could maybe burn it for you and send it.check with pob but.

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Xparent Cyan Tapatalk 2

 

[wiz569]

Tbh any livecd will do even a linux one,it will boot up an OS and then let you access your hard drive,but you will need to either upload your data to the cloud or else transfer it to an external drive or usb stick etc depending on how big it is,

If the disk is already failing,and badly by the sounds of it,I wouldnt even try to do a 1:1 copy,just get the important bits off

 

[morilihochili]

Or take it out and connect to usb caddy and transfer data that way.

 

[Purity]

Don't worry dude, we'll get it up and running again

I hope that the drive is not in a really bad state. If you can partially get to Windows then it's a positive sign

 

[Highlander]

MASSIVE

thanks to Purity, we unplugged dead drive, and formatted the new sata drive, nice clean new install of windows xp, plugged deadish drive back in and transferred all the photo's, vids, data info i knew i deffo needed to keep and then as i had 90% of my progs and serials in a folder, i was able to install majority over the last 24 hours.

lesson learned to do back-ups regular.

thanks again Purity, my turn to treat you and yours to a meal soon

 

[Purity]

No worries pal. Glad you didn't lose anything important