Comp help..please

[Guest]

ok..so I log on Sunday morning and my comp is fine. I hop on an alt, check an auction or two, everything is dandy. Off to work. Come back in the afternoon, BOOM

Windows cannot start because file \windows\system32\etc (something to that effect) is corrupted or missing. Need to restart with the start up disk and hit R to attempt to repair. whoopteedoo...

The problem is, there is the other problem that during start up, my system can't locate/doesnt recognize my HD. SOm I cant do anything with the disk. any ideas or suggestions?

[Guest]

Check the cables going to your hard drive. Make sure both ends (hard drive and motherboard) are plugged in all the way. You'd be surprised how often a semi-loose cable can cause problems.

IF you have another computer, go the HD manufacturers website and grab their diagnostic tools. Usually they can be downloaded to a floppy or burned to a CD. Try those, if you can, to see what problem it MAY identify.

Hope this helps.
-Kern

[Utsusemi]

yeah all that Kern said should help. sounds like one of two things happened, either you have a loose cable, or your HD took its final breaths.

worst case senario is you will need to buy an new HD, and if you dont have one, a windows xp home disk. you can get HDs fairly cheap i want to say a 120g HD is about 80 bucks give or take. and a Windows disk is going to cost you about $100. all that just depends on where you go to buy the stuff.

dont go to a retail store they will charge you about 100% more than what you pay online at Tigerdirect.com or newegg.com