Help! New user with computer sudden crash and unable to start!

Hello all!
We have an old Acer junker computer which we bought 3 years ago for christmas. However, ever since we first bought it, we have experienced many problems with it; notably, every so often, it crashes and emits a pattern we have dubbed "the death click". It is a series of clicks and whirs that sound somewhat similar to a running disk drive or processor. Unfortunately, I am not quite an expert on the computer, but I do have some basic knowledge.
Before, we have been able to get over the problems using the Factory reset feature. However, we have recently installed a Windows 7 upgrade, in the hopes that it would fix all our Vista woes. A couple days after installing, it "death clicked" again, and we are unable to reset it to factory default due to the Windows 7 replacement.
We are able to use the computer at very slight levels thanks to an Ubuntu disc given to us by a more knowledgeable relative. However, we do not know if this is a hardware malfunction (unlikely, due to the system reset temporarily removing the problem) or software (don't know what causes it, but unlikely to be malware after installing Norton 360 at the same approximate time as the Windows 7 upgrade). Any ideas and possible solutions?

 

Clicks, and whirs usually indicate a hard drive issue.

It sounds like you needed a replacement from the get go.

However, this is just a casual observation, from the symptoms you describe.

 

I have a question about that. If it were a hard drive issue, then why would it suddenly stop every time we reset the computer? Would it be something along the lines of a localized problem?

 

Sorry for intruding, I could be way off here, but I had a similar problem when I installed windows 7.

When you installed windows 7, did you set your BIOS to boot from CD?

when finished installing, did you check to make sure that your BIOS re-set to boot from your HD?

 

Okay, I got a message pop up on the computer a couple minutes ago while using Ubuntu, that says "A hard disk may be failing One or more hard disks report health problems. Click the icon to get more information. When I clicked the icon, it said DISK FAILURE IS IMMINENT. However, I have no nearby drives to backup to, nor can I readily remove the hard drive (Desktop model and no knowledge of computer guts).
Anybody?

 

Nico_Palm, no, I installed from within Windows Vista.

 

my apologies for intruding, I just figured I would ask, my PC didnt reset the BIOS after upgrading from Vista to Windows 7, and gave me similar symptoms.

Regarding your problem, I believe Ubuntu has answered your question. Do not use the HD unless you absoluely need to. personally I would shut it down, and not turn it back on until I was ready to back up everything, and just pray to god it didnt fail while backing up.

If you need more info on backing up your work, there are many threads here that detail that, or I'm sure one of the very helpfull people here will post a link for you to follow.

I wish you luck

 

Okay, that computer is offline completely, and we will not turn it on again until we can back up everything.
Any idea why the hard drive is being ruined to such a degree? Could it be corrupted startup files, or could it be Vista-related and not fixed by the Windows 7 upgrade?

 

Didn't you say in your first post that this has been happening since you bought it? or started quite soon after you bought it?

Was it under warranty when this problem started?

It's hard to say whats causing your hard drive to fail. Or why it's been showing symptoms of failing for 3 years and is still alive, Thats an interesting question I hope someone else here can answer.

 

It started happening quite soon after when we first bought the machine, and yes it was still under warranty. However, we hadn't put much data onto it yet, so it was just a minor annoyance. However, we didn't know just how bad the problem was, and it has happened too many times to count since then.
I hope somebody else can help with the question as well. It seems somewhat similar to the old unreliable Microsoft Zunes, which would only last a couple of weeks until they broke again. A friend keeps telling me about their stupidity, and so far, he has had 4 replacements under warranty.
Sorry for rambling.

 

I did some googling for you on "Acer desktop hard drive failure"

Let me just say first that this seems to be a very common problem with Acer's. Some site even suggest a manufacturer's fault or defect that causes these HD's to go bad right of the get-go like yours.

This link below is for backing up your info, and using your Acer Recovery CD to hopefully fix the problem as suggested by Acer. It will essentially rebuild all the data that originally came on your harddrive back to a factory spec.

it the problems still happen after rebuilding the data, you may need a new HD all together.

http://support.acer.com/acerpanam/desktop/0000/Acer/Veriton5100/Veriton5100faq19.shtml