[RICK55FLA]

My wife's Dell laptop was working fine this morning,,She came home from running errands and it won't boot up and it says " the file is possibly corrupt. the file header checksum does not match the computed checksum"

she took it a shop,,,looked at it and said "The hard drive is bad " and want $270 to repair.

Ideas,,,junk it & buy something new?


I just picked up a CHEAP Toshiba for $370,,

Thanks

 

[trink408]

Could probably buy a hard drive for $60-70 bucks, and reload the OS/drivers back on it if you have the install discs?

 

[longcar]

F-11 at boot. Restore to factory settings

 

[Inbredjedd]

You can buy a new hard drive pretty cheap. If you dont have the original system disks you can buy a copy of windows then google Dell drivers and make sure you go to the dell site only. There are a lot of bullshit sites offering free drivers but they are garbage spyware. At the dell site you type in your model number and other info and download all your drivers. Here is a link to dell: http://support.dell.com/support/ind...=4220626&acd=sDwEJIxj9,23042367714,901pdb6671

 

[RICK55FLA]

Thanks guys ,,we are trying these ideas ,,F11 doesn't work-F12 does ,,she is trying to load Defaults

 

[Inbredjedd]

If you have things on that drive that you REALLY want data recovery services are out there.

 

[VortechKid]

270$ for a installing a new hardrive huh? Wow,rip-off artist working somewhere today. They must not realize how cheap new pc's are these days .

 

[Inbredjedd]

Also changing the hard drive is simple it should take less than 5 minutes.

 

[RICK55FLA]

270$ for a installing a new hardrive huh? Wow,rip-off artist working somewhere today. They must not realize how cheap new pc's are these days .

No shit,,,Going to try something else as soon as i go take a crap,,be right back

 

[fragment]

If you're having a spindle issue and you have data you really need off the drive, take the drive out of the laptop, put it in the freezer for a couple of hours, and then quickly put it in the laptop, boot it up, and move the data to a thumb drive before it crashes.

However, I've seen several of those low tech help desk fellas diagnose a bad hard drive and its really just a file was corrupted. A windows repair would often fix the problem (a repair is run as part of the system recovery, it rewrites all of the OS data but leaves personal data in place). I wouldn't run out and buy a new laptop right away, there's still some diagnosis to do.

 

[STFU!]

270$ for a installing a new hardrive huh? Wow,rip-off artist working somewhere today. They must not realize how cheap new pc's are these days .

Right! They should do it for free. Fucking assholes. How dare they try to make a living.

I bet you work for free don't you?

 

[Espresso]

buy a hard disk adapter off of Amazon for $8. It allows you to hook up virtually any internal hard harddrive as an external via USB. You can then read everything on your harddrive. I have had "bad" hard drives hooked them up to another laptop & it is a simple fix like a file or extension.

This is what I have, It works flawlessly. I have diag'ed about 20 hard drives. This is what most PC repair places use. PLus it allows you to use old hard dives you have laying around as extra storage. The drives are hot swappable meaning you can simply unplug one & plug another in without disconnecting power, etc.

http://www.amazon.com/Drive-Adapter...1339793655&sr=8-1&keywords=hard+drive+adapter

 

[Inbredjedd]

Right! They should do it for free. Fucking assholes. How dare they try to make a living.

I bet you work for free don't you?

Profit is not a bad word gouging your customers is bad. $270 to change out something as simple as a hard drive on a laptop is like charging $270 to change your air filter.

 

[Inbredjedd]

buy a hard disk adapter off of Amazon for $8. It allows you to hook up virtually any internal hard harddrive as an external via USB. You can then read everything on your harddrive. I have had "bad" hard drives hooked them up to another laptop & it is a simple fix like a file or extension.

This is what I have, It works flawlessly. I have diag'ed about 20 hard drives. This is what most PC repair places use. PLus it allows you to use old hard dives you have laying around as extra storage. The drives are hot swappable meaning you can simply unplug one & plug another in without disconnecting power, etc.

http://www.amazon.com/Drive-Adapter...1339793655&sr=8-1&keywords=hard+drive+adapter

This does work I have done this quite a bit myself just remove the hard drive first to make sure you get the right adapter there are two different types that I know of.

 

[VortechKid]

Right! They should do it for free. Fucking assholes. How dare they try to make a living.

I bet you work for free don't you?

Sorry,as simple as it is to change out a hard-drive? Lemme say it again so you can get it through your head,it's a RIPOFF~!

 

[slowmaro]

Most Dell laptops you just remove 2 screws underneath and the hard disk slides out of the side. $270 isn't as insane as some people here are implying...

a quality laptop hard drive is about $70-90

They'll probably be installing a new copy of Windows... whats that shit like $100?

Probably a few hours worth of actual work installing and reconfiguring the system...

 

[VortechKid]

Just an fyi since it's become debatable on the price quoted to install a new hardrive. I called up our PC repair shop,told him about the price that rick was quoted,guess what? He laughed,imagine that. He said the most he would personally charge is 120-150$ for the same repair,thats a far cry from that BS quote of 270$.The guy I talked to,remarked the same as I said,PC's can be bought new for 270-300$

 

[RICK55FLA]

Thanks for all the input, we just got home from going out for a Father's Day dinner,,

We will try the suggestions later tonight or in the morning.



THANKS AGAIN!!!!

 

[YellowBU]

Ive got an old dell laptop you may could use as parts?

 

[BIG CAT]

270 is a ass raping with no lube.