Serious Problem With Desktop - Help Required!

[Lie-in King]

Hi guys - I'm posting from my laptop because my desktop is seemingly dead!

I've a Hewlett Packard Pavilion p6-2388ea that died on me about 3 hours ago. The PC's description is the best I can give, I don't remember its "model name" - if it has one. It's running Win 8, has 8GB of RAM (I think), with a 1TB hard drive. I managed to get the "model number" as above by hitting F8 to try & access safe mode & finding "System Information" - there is no sign of the "Safe Mode" option, btw.

All I had open was Google, Outlook (Hotmail) & Skype, when I got blue circles of doom on everything & was unable to open Task Manager.

I turned everything off at the wall, waited 5 minutes, powered-up again & got a completely blank screen.

F8 & "Hard Disk Test" got me the following info -

"Hard Disk Short DST: Failed
Failure ID: 9e5pvs-00076e-x87tok-60ud03 (I didn't think to note if they're 0's or o's, sorry).

My last attempt to start-up (with F8) gave me -

"1720-SMART Hard Drive detects imminent failure"

Now I'm guessing that's not a good thing!

Have been on phone to HP, who were as much use as a chocolate fireguard - £202 to have them collect & repair, £35 just to speak to a techie, with no guaranteed result.

Does anyone think there's anything else to try, or do I just suck up the repair bill?

As always, thank you for your time & attention :-)

[Tuvok]

SMART is a motherboard feature that monitors the status of a hard disk, and to warn of impending doom - as it has done for you!

Is the computer still under warranty? If so, check what it says about hard disk failure.

Do you have backups - ie. did you get installation disks with the computer, or were you meant to make them yourself? And did you? Also have you backed up your files/photos etc.? Do you have installation disks for all your software?

If you can get it going, backup now! Don't stop until you have everything.

If its out of warranty, you could fit a new drive yourself, or take it to a repair shop.

[Lie-in King]

Tuvok - thank you for your helpful post & please accept my apologies for my late reply :-)

No, I didn't have installation disks - no, I never made my own ones (bad L-i K, naughty L-i K!) & I only have a few things of my own on a USB stick.

Ah well, you live & learn! I've just been to PC World to buy a new box - all I have to do is calm down long enough to plug it in & hope the buƃƃer works!

[Tuvok]

Do you mean you've bought a new computer?

[Lie-in King]

I do & I can't make the keyboard work - I'll get there, just might take a few more hours...or days... :-)

[Tuvok]

If its a PS2 keyboard, make sure you haven't put it in the mouse socket.

If its a USB keyboard, try a different socket.

[Tuvok]

PS2 connector is the smaller end of this

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/like/160636124781?limghlpsr=true&hlpv=2&ops=true&viphx=1&;hlpht=true&lpid=108&;device=t&adtype=pla&;crdt=0&ff3=1&;ff11=ICEP3.0.0&ff12=67&ff13=80&ff14=108&;ff19=0

[Lie-in King]

Tuvok - it was my stupid fault as I forgot the wireless dongle doo-dah thingy! All is now well, thank you for taking the time to reply :-)

[dannyk13]

Hi L-I-K, probably cheaper in the long run to replace it.

[DTCwordfan]

Bullguard is what I use for virus protection and firewall etc, LIK - and they do a back-up service as well.....it was free for 18 months with my Asus and then I've paid about 35 quid annually.

[Lie-in King]

Thank you both for your posts - DTC, I'm more than happy with Windows Defender & Malwarebytes - both free.

Danny - all I'd forgotten was the dongle the keyboard works now, lovely lit one, sparkle, sparkle - sorry, am easily distracted! Ooh, a squirrel!

[Mamyalynne]

Nuts!!? ^^

[Lie-in King]

At least I remember where mine are...

[Lie-in King]

Although I did lose my green Xmas balls - hmmm....

[Mamyalynne]

Crackers!!?^

[Lie-in King]

What's Santa's favourite pizza?

One that's deep pan, crisp & even.

Boom-boom!

Oh, you didn't mean those crackers, did you? Doh!

[Lie-in King]

@methyl - I rang HP because I was out of options & because I'm an adult & allowed to make my own decisions about such things.

I bought the PC from PC World & yes, it's 4 months (or so) outside the warranty.

As I've stated above, I now have a new PC & have managed to get it all working in a tickety-boo fashion.

I bought the new PC rather than wait the 7-10 days I was quoted for a repair - call me mad!

May I be honest? As a self-proclaimed "computer professional", you don't engender much confidence with your posts - to me, at least - please don't take that as a personal attack, I speak as I find, that's all.

I used to run the mainframes for several major companies - it's only PCs that I fall down on - especially the hateful Windows 8.

[Lie-in King]

@methyl - thank you for your reasoned reply.

Both my new PC & laptop run 8.1, but I loathe the Metro screen & have adapted both to show a Win 7 type desktop. I genuinely don't understand M'soft's plan - Win 8 (+) is meant for touch-screen devices - I've said this before, but will repeat myself - who wants to be cleaning greasy fingerprints from the screen 4, 5, 6 times a day? (And if you're not cleaning your screen, shame on you!) It is & will remain (IMO) a useless OS.