Hard Drive Failure and Repair – Utah
Hard Drive failure is the most common computer repair. Hard drives go out for a variety of reasons. Hard drives come in 2 sizes primarily. For desktop computers they are 3.5” in size and for laptops they are 2.5” in size. The hard drive and cdrom or dvd drives in computers along with the fans are the only mechanical pieces of equipment in a PC. The motherboard and all else is electronic on circuit boards and have no mechanical or moving parts. Hence it makes sense they are a common problem for computer repairs and failure.
Hard drives can fail in a variety of ways. The motor that spins them can stop working. That is easy to diagnose. Pickup the hard drive while it is on and you will feel the spinning action as you move it slowly side to side. It will feel like a gyroscope in your hand. That means it is spinning. The circuit board that is built onto the backside of the hard drive can fail. That would mean a complete failure also. Thirdly, the needles inside that are between the platters are called spindles. They are the reading heads of the data on the multiple platters and if they fail to read they cause a hard drive failure also. So, hard drive can fail in many ways.
Often Windows will not complete a boot because the file in needs is unreadable from the hard drive. Those boot up files are need every time you start your computer. Hence they have the most activity on that part of the hard drive, the most wear and tear like tires. So it makes sense that not booting up is often a result of that part of the hard drive being worn out. Unfortunately you have to verify that the problem is not a virus that has changed or damage the boot files. Virus or damaged Operating Systme files can be repaired by reloading Windows or resetting you computer.
Currently PCs that need new hard drives are caught by the doubling of prices in the last 4 months. Because of floods in Thailand (where most hard drives are manufactured) the price of hard drives has doubled and even troubled in some models. The price for PC repairs of hard drives will come back down with more time. I strongly recommend you not purchase a used hard drive or try and repair a broken drive. Some believe they can repair the sectors and set them aside and use the rest of the hard drive. I have found this to be false. The time it takes to install Windows and find the drivers, load your applications, install printers, antivirus and everything else is a huge investment that would have to be repeated. So don’t buy used hard drives.
Steve Morris
Owner – www.aGeeko.com Computer Services
Cedar Hills, Utah
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