Problem with Dell Latitude at start up

Hey Gang, I will try and boil down my issue so that it makes sense. Several weeks ago I turned on the Dell laptop only to have it open to a black screen with the cursor stuck right in the middle. I tried many attempts to start the thing, but it would never boot all the way to the desk top. Even in safe mode, it was just a black screen with safe mode at the corners. I tried to run diagnostics, changed the order programs loaded, basically any bit of advice I could do that I found on the web. Finally, since nothing worked, I installed a parallel version of XP. First thing, of course, I grabbed what important info I needed off the HD. I've been using the computer with the 'new' XP for a few weeks now without issue, but in the last few days, I would come back to the laptop after it had been on for a few hours to find it frozen. The only thing I could do was to shut it down by the power switch. Yesterday, when I went to boot it up, it was frozen right away, with the cursor in the middle of the screen, the desktop background loaded, but no programs visible on the the desktop. I shut it down and rebooted with the same results.

My questions are: does this sound like a software or hardware issue? If it's a hardware issue, is it just a detereorating HD which can be replaced? I might be more interested in switching out the HD than trying to find a new computer. I know it's a brief description of events; I'll fill in any info I can to help find a solution. Thanks ahead of time for any help!

 

Sounds like hardware to me, although it's puzzling that it worked for a while with the new XP. Any chance you have a malware problem?

If you can get it to run, you could try a hard drive check. Here's one free app to test it with:

http://download.cnet.com/Active-Hard-Disk-Monitor/3000-2086_4-10879888.html

 

Hey GCWesq, Did the hard drive download and am unsure of how to interpret the results. Overall health is OK at 51, but that doesn't seem reassuring. Also, the program detected one block after scanning. I did a CHKDSC through Windows after that, and the same block still shows on the hard drive scan. Yesterday, the machine froze solid twice while surfing. Today, the computer froze up after turning it on once. After I restarted, I got it to the desktop, but couldn't surf, as there was no connection. Didn't even show my (or any) modem available. I repaired the connection several times and it finally seems to be holding.

As for malware, I never was able to scan the older XP. I have scanned this version several times with AVG and SuperAntiSpyware with no results. That's really what got me thinking that this is a hardware issue, since the freezing seems to have 'migrated' over to this version of XP.

Thanks again for any help!

 

G'day JB.
I agree, 51% doesn't sound all that flash for your hard drive, even though it says it's OK. How old is it? The display will tell you how many hours it has done as well. (I suppose you've figured out that you have to click on the hard drive listing (top left) to get the details). That will give you a temperature record, and, under SMART info, a bunch of horizontal bar graphs - the green should be well over to the right on each one, and certainly not to the left of the red line on any of them (and preferably not to the left of the yellow line).
I take it you used the scan disk option and it found a Bad Block (you just said it found 'a block'). Not good. You may be able to repair it by adding the following to your checkdisk command when using Windows CHKDSK ('R' for Repair):
CHKDSK C: /R
It sounds like it may be OTWO (on the way out) though.

 

You might want to download the HD manufacturer's diagnostic utility and run the Long test. I find them better at fixing problems than chkdsk. You should be able to find the brand of HD you have in Device Manager.