Disk read error on new Executor 6400

[Dyfan]

I bought an executor 6400 last month. Worked perfectly for a few weeks, but I'm now getting a 'Disk read error occured, Press Crtl+Alt+Del to restart' message whenever I try to boot up.

I booted from the windows xp cd, went to the repair menu, and ran 'chkdsk /r'. I instantly got the following: "The volume appears to contain one or more unrecoverable problems."

Any ideas? Should I try running the FIXMBR command?

[Taxation]

if worse comes to worse then you may need to do a full format

[Dyfan]

Update: When I type 'dir' in the repair console, I get a message saying "an error occured during directory enumeration". Oh dear.

[asteroid]

hd is almost certainly kaput

good way to check this is get Maxtor's (hd in most N PCs) diagnostic software from their website.

call N and get it returned, or you just get the hard disk sent back.

[Dyfan]

Well, I sent it back last week, and it returned to me today.

A note included in the package said that the only thing replaced was the battery. Odd, I was sure it was the HD, but hey, maybe that means my data is still there. I turned the machine on, and it still had the exact same problem booting as before, and the same error messages about the disk. Great.

Now, I won't lie, I was pretty bloomin annoyed at this. I'm sure there was a problem with the battery, but wasn't the system tested before being sent back? The prospect of sending the whole thing back again didn't exactly appeal to me, so I decided to look into it further myself.

The system actually has two 250 gb HDs in a Raid configuration, so I unplugged the drive I suspected to be faulty, and formatted and installed windows on the other one. Worked like a charm. I plugged the other disk in and had a look at it through windows. As far as I can tell, it's corrupted.

So what now? Could I send the problem disk back on its own, so that I can at least use the computer while I wait to get it sorted?

[Danno]

i am sorry to hear that you are still having problems with the system. if you contact tech support with the order number we will be able to arrange getting the system or the hard drive back for test.

[Spencos]

This is odd, as last wedensday I had a similiar problem to this. I turned my computer on in the morning and was greeted with a message saying "system disk failure. Please enter system disk" - something like that.

I phoned tech support and spoke to some nice guy, who took me through steps in the bios and different solutions. The problem seemed to be that one of my hard disks may have crashed and now the computer didn't read any of the two. I had no luck and he arranged for a pickup and the system would have to be returned.

While sorting out the packaging, I thought I'd give it one more mess around in the bios settings and try different hard drive slots etc, and I manged to get one of the hard disks read by the computer. After a little more toggle with the hard drive slots and the motherboard settings, they both were read by the system and I was straight back onto windows xp, logged on and all my stuff was there, just like before.

Rang up tech support again and spoke to the same guy, he didn't have a clue as to how the computer couldnt read the hard disks earlier and now they are being read, and it is all working. Neither do I.

Weird.. but if I have another problem like this in the future then I will be worried.

[Dyfan]

Oh great.

I just got a CMOS checksum error on bootup and the system clock was wrong. Two batteries going within two months of buying the system?

Is there anything else that could be causing all this? Could it be a motherboard issue?

What I'm really worried about here is if this problem could lead to another hard disk catastrophe. Is that possible?

[aldudturn]

I'm curious, what motherboard do you have? I've got a foxconn P965 something and I think I have the same problem with the battery dying.

[Dyfan]

I'm curious, what motherboard do you have? I've got a foxconn P965 something and I think I have the same problem with the battery dying.

Yup, Foxconn P9657. Have you had multiple batteries fail?

[aldudturn]

I'm curious, what motherboard do you have? I've got a foxconn P965 something and I think I have the same problem with the battery dying.

Yup, Foxconn P9657. Have you had multiple batteries fail?

Well I bought a barebones bundle, C2DE6300, and only just got round to setting it up a few weeks ago. The battery was dead so I just assumed that because it hadn't been used for a couple of months it somehow died. I then stuck in another battery I found and that lasted a few days, but now it's dead so novatech are sending me a new battery. I hadn't really thought anything of it though, I just assumed the battery I found in the house was dud as well, but maybe there's a fault on the motherboard.

Also I'm getting a similar message when I turn the computer on with my external hard drive plugged in - for some reason it keeps putting the external hd as the highest priority even though i've saved it as the internal should have the highest priority.

Edit: just tried a new battery, my settings are saved so far but still got my external hard drive problem.

[Vwbus]

I'm curious, what motherboard do you have? I've got a foxconn P965 something and I think I have the same problem with the battery dying.

Yup, Foxconn P9657. Have you had multiple batteries fail?

I have the same motherboard in mine and had the same cmos checksum problems. Replaced the battery and all was fine for about a month, then it happened again. What we noticed was it seemed to happen when the pc was disconnected from the mains supply. Since then I have left it plugged in with the psu switch on and have had no problems. Also set the pc clock to syncronise with the atomic clock daily instead of weekly.

[Dyfan]

There appear to be some bios updates that address something to do with cmos checksum errors on the foxconn site. I don't quite understand what they're trying to say the problem is, though.

http://www.foxconnchannel.com/service/d ... -us0000003 (http://www.foxconnchannel.com/service/downloads.aspx?Model=P9657AA-8EKRS2H&DownID=en-us0000003)