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LAPTOP LOCKED UP
I have an laptop (inspiron 8100) and it has been behaving real weird the last few months. It was sluggish and seemed bogged down. Now it is completely acting up. I tried reformatting the hard drive and reinstalling XP but the computer locks up. Sometimes it will reinstall and other times it just locks up. Even when it successfully reinstalls the OS it is only a matter of days before it completely locks up. It also has a problem recognizing CD-Roms. I will put one in and it will say there is none in there. Then I will put a new one in and it will recognize than one and then recognize the other one. I am at my wits end. Should I try wiping out the entire hard drive instead of just reformatting? Is it even the hard drive
crchief
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November 14th, 2003 20:00
whymewhynot
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November 14th, 2003 22:00
Ok this is way beyond me I will admit, for the computer not to boot via the floppy is strange. It can obviously read the floppy if it starts to boot ( loads the 95 starting line), but for some reason cannot find the command com file.
Possiblity's, floppy is bad , try getting the floppy written with another drive ( ie the drive that wrote the floppy may be misaligned and not writing correctly so your 8100 cannot read it, or the floppy may be damaged or corrupt). I have had floppy's that read in one machine but not in another. If you don't have access to another machine straight away try redoing the floppy package with a new set of floppy's or at least replacing the first disc.
The above would be the hoped for solution, in my view anyway, at least that points away from any serious problems. I will have to defer to others on the board to figure out what is going on , IDE controller ??? or something.
One thing I have learnt is just when you think it is all hopeless someone will come up with a smart idea that either fixes it and you kick youself for not seeing the obvious, or you find out it is in fact hopeless
Whymewhynot
crchief
13 Posts
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November 14th, 2003 22:00
crchief
13 Posts
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November 14th, 2003 22:00
whymewhynot
174 Posts
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November 14th, 2003 22:00
One thing , you say the floppy booted up into the utilites menu on another laptop. I presume you mean that you loaded all five floppys in to get to the utilities menu. Sorry if the question seems stupid
Whymewhynot
whymewhynot
174 Posts
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November 14th, 2003 23:00
Ok your last post may have given me a clue, I have been experimenting. Though I do not know why you get a menu as to which drive to boot off ?
You state that you went through the fist initializtion screen up to the point it asked for disc 2 ? If you got that far then there is really no problem, this program only loads enough to get the diagnostics going, you have to put all 5 discs in. Then you can test your hardware.
Experimenting with my 8100 I found that if you boot up into the first disc and get to the end where it asks you Ok or Cancel to putting in the next disc, if you click Cancel and then quickly remove the floppy you get the by now infamous " Command interperer " line and nothing happens
If the above is correct then just keep putting the floppies in, and test your hard ware. You cannot just put the first disc in to boot the machine, if you wait after pressing cancel you will eventually be dropped to the command prompt A: but it won't be much use to you
whymewhynot
Message Edited by whymewhynot on 11-14-2003 07:18 PM
crchief
13 Posts
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November 14th, 2003 23:00
My mistake when I was talking about getting to the second disk I was talking about the working laptop I was testing the floppy on. I still can't get the floppy on the faulty laptop to do anything other than give me the command intrepreter line
whymewhynot
174 Posts
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November 14th, 2003 23:00
Darn it and I thought we had it,
so the bottom line here is you boot from the floppy and get the Starting 95 line, then it comes up asking for the command line interpreter ( command.com) ? What does the bios say about the Floppy ??
I would at this stage use the CD " Drivers and Utilities" , set the CD to boot ( in BIOS) and try to run the diagnostics from there. I personally have never gotten this to work, and I don't know why. In fact I tried to do that recently when I was having my harddisc problems and still could not get it to work.
I really have to say that I am stumped, but there are far better people out there who probably will have the answer, I will continue to ponder.
Whymewhynot
whymewhynot
174 Posts
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November 15th, 2003 00:00
Good news, never give up and never panic. Hopefully you will find the problem then you only have to try and find a solution.
Whymewhynot
crchief
13 Posts
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November 15th, 2003 00:00
johnallg
7.3K Posts
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November 16th, 2003 23:00
crchief
13 Posts
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November 17th, 2003 00:00
Message Edited by crchief on 11-16-2003 08:59 PM
Lost in Bologna
2 Posts
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December 4th, 2003 15:00
Similar problem to yours - I have an Inspiron 1100 that is all of 6 months old and it locks up just about 90 minutes into my usage - regardless of what programs I'm running.
I am a little concerned about totally wiping the hard drive clean, but I can't figure out what else to do. Any thoughts?