Sony Vaio VGN-S4XP/B will not Boot.

Hi Guys/Gals,
I'm afraid that after switching on my Vaio it will not boot up, so I am just left with the Vaio Logo on screen. (Pressing F8 during start up does not do anything.)

The only clue is a slight "ticking" noise ( hard disc ?) for about 2 minutes after switching on.

I could not find anything similar at Sony's Vaio Help section either, so any
ideas gratefully received.

Ciao,
Flywheel.

 

The ticking noise sounds rather like a hard drive , going, or, even caput.
If you succeed in getting it to start, back up any important data, to dvd/cd.
If you cannot get it to run, then I suggest that, if you have data on it, that you want to rescue, get another hard drive, and set it up as master, reinstall your operating system, and connect the old drive as slave.
Then go into disk management console, and rescue data from there.
Come back for more advice, if you cannot get it working, as there is not much that can be done with a hard drive, if it has packed up, but sometimes, they can be made to work, perhaps once, for a short time.

 

Thanks a lot Baklogic - since then I have experimented a bit.
By pressing F2 the Phoenix Bios Setup Utility screen comes up but verything looks normal there & I haven't changed anything other than to Press F10 to exit with the (original) default settings.

It then reboots again to the Vaio screen only & "ticks" for a couple of minutes and then goes quiet with the original problem still there.

As you say sounds like the Hard Disc - the machine is just outside warranty of course ! (15 months)

 

Most hard drives come with a manufacturer's warranty of 3 years. Even though it's in a Sony PC, Sony didn't make the hard drive and there's a chance you can get it replaced directly from the manuafacturer. Then again, they may tell you to go to Sony. Find out who made the hard drive by looking in the BIOS and writing down the model number and then entering the model number in a Google search, or simply remove the hard drive from the PC. Go to the manufacturer's web site, go to the warranty/RMA page, and enter the serial number (you'll need a bootable system info tool like the old Aida16 to get the serial number w/o physically removing the drive from the PC) and they'll tell you if it's covered under their warranty.

hopperdave2000

If you need to recover some data, let us know, and we'll do what we can to help you.

 

As Hopperdave says, there should be a warrenty on the hard disk,from manufacture.
But, just to be certain, you could try the windows repair from your cd, as it will leave data intact, but the updates, and some programs might have to be reinstalled.
If it gets so far and hangs, or, cannot find your hard drive, you know, that it is most likely the hard drive.

 

I had a similar problem with my cousins Sony Vaio and it turned out to be a faulty RAM card (known fault on Sony's). If there are two in try removing one & booting then replace & try removing the other.

Worth a try

Banacek

 

Thanks Banacek, -did it make the clicking sound, too?

 

Thanks Guys -I have checked out the Hard Drive and it is a Toshiba Mk1032GSX with a MTBF of 300,000 hrs !
I think the 3 year guarantee may only be in the US not Uk, but will check up tomorrow + the RAM + the Boot disc ( No Sony Recovery disc supplied as the normal "recovery" is on a partition of this single drive - fat lot of use !)

 

Just to update everyone, I have now gone through the Sony Support guys who tried a few other tricks to no avail and so I have bitten the bullet and they will take it away for a new hard disc repair job.

As suspected over here in Blighty the hard disc warranty is now only for the year, but at least they will replace the sticky keyboard at the same time as the hard disc for no extra cost and they will also re-warranty it all.

Thanks to everyone for their assistance - very helpful, even if ultimately all
back to square one !
Ciao, ciao.

 

Glad to see that all our suspicions were correct- and it was the hard drive.
We do not like to give in to replacement of anything, and trying all the fixes, confirms a faulty hard drive - then, we have done our bit - hope they don't sting you too much.