blue screen

[brad59]

Hi all, Please bear with me as I'm not very computer literate lol!
My daughters laptop (old dell c400) just went to a blue screen when starting up! Anyway,was told to re-load windows disc. However there's no cd drive or floppy drive!
Found an old external floppy drive but don't have windows on floppy!
Also ran diognostics and it passed everything until it came to DST SHORT STATUS TEST,then came up failed! Any suggestions or is it a brick?

 

[sneekypeet]

Is there any vital info on the drive?

looking on the net, it is likely HDD failure (worst case), sectors being corrupt (possibly fixable), to the operating system being corrupt (rewrite should solve it)

If you dont have any info needed, and you have a desktop, via adapters you could boot the laptop drive and test things deeper and use said desktops CD drive to write the OS.

 

[DRDNA]

did you try booting to safe mode then running check disk with repair?

Welcome to TPU!!!!

 

[brad59]

Is there any vital info on the drive?

looking on the net, it is likely HDD failure (worst case), sectors being corrupt (possibly fixable), to the operating system being corrupt (rewrite should solve it)

If you dont have any info needed, and you have a desktop, via adapters you could boot the laptop drive and test things deeper and use said desktops CD drive to write the OS.

O.K. Sorry to sound thick, but what adapters woul I need?

 

[brad59]

did you try booting to safe mode then running check disk with repair?

Welcome to TPU!!!!

Tried safe mode, same blue screen!

 

[brad59]

Just a thought, but could I Put windows on usb pen drive and try it that way?

 

[Solaris17]

you can try but it all depends on if the laptop supports usb boots...i dont think my C500 does

 

[sneekypeet]

Circled below in red is the critter, googling now for the correct terminology and pricing.

removed image as now I rememberd the one shown is for an optical drive not a HDD

 

[Solaris17]

Circled below in red is the critter, googling now for the correct terminology and pricing.
http://img.techpowerup.org/091023/tpuhelp.jpg

its called an LCD inverter

nvm im an idiot.

 

[brad59]

Circled below in red is the critter, googling now for the correct terminology and pricing.
http://img.techpowerup.org/091023/tpuhelp.jpg

Thanks. is this what I need to solve the problem?

 

[sneekypeet]

well Im assuming the HDD in that lappy is IDE, so you might not need that specific one, but you will need a way to adapt the smaller IDE port of the lappy drive to either a larger IDE for a desktop, or to SATA if the desktop has that option.

Without having the drive and PC at my disposal, I am just guessing as to a specific one.

Will it fix the issue, no. But it should allow you to diagnose it better and see if there is a chance at revival, over just buying a new drive for the lappy, and still having no way to write the OS

 

[erocker]

It is very common for the DST SHORT STATUS TEST error to occur when the hard drive is on it's way out. The hard drive most likely has some bad sectors on it. That being said, I'm looking into how Dell would want to go about reinstalling an O/S.

 

[brad59]

well Im assuming the HDD in that lappy is IDE, so you might not need that specific one, but you will need a way to adapt the smaller IDE port of the lappy drive to either a larger IDE for a desktop, or to SATA if the desktop has that option.

Without having the drive and PC at my disposal, I am just guessing as to a specific one.

Will it fix the issue, no. But it should allow you to diagnose it better and see if there is a chance at revival, over just buying a new drive for the lappy, and still having no way to write the OS

WOW! I think it's probably too technical for me.Can I buy an hdd with os already on?

 

[phanbuey]

not really since the OS usually installs drivers and all the stuff specific to the computer that its installed on

you can use another laptop to install an os onto a new drive, and then just pop it into the laptop... dont activate the OS until after its in the OLD machine, and be prepared to give it a new key if its XP, because it will lock itself after it detects a new MB.

If you're lucky you will have minimal problems.

 

[brad59]

not really since the OS usually installs drivers and all the stuff specific to the computer that its installed on

you can use another laptop to install an os onto a new drive, and then just pop it into the laptop... dont activate the OS until after its in the OLD machine, and be prepared to give it a new key if its XP, because it will lock itself after it detects a new MB.

If you're lucky you will have minimal problems.

Thanks for the advice I'll give it a try!

 

[erocker]

As far as getting anything bootable for your laptop you need a Dell Media Port cable and drive. You could try contacting Dell support to see what they offer for you.

If you have a local computer shop, they would put a copy of Windows on a new drive for you, but it would probablly end up costing more than the laptop is worth.

Phanbuey has good advice.

 

[brad59]

As far as getting anything bootable for your laptop you need a Dell Media Port cable and drive. You could try contacting Dell support to see what they offer for you.

If you have a local computer shop, they would put a copy of Windows on a new drive for you, but it would probablly end up costing more than the laptop is worth.

Phanbuey has good advice.

Thanks erocker and all, for advice. I'd like to comment on this great site and helpful members.!
I'm glad I stumbled across it!