Massive System Trouble

I'm not quite sure whether this is the correct place to post this, and I apologize if it isn't, but here goes:
My Acer Aspire 5100 notebook has always acted strangely, however this past month it's began to get unmanagable. Here's my problem:
System crashes itself with a blue screen, then attempts to reboot. Upon reboot, I am presented with two beeps at the Acer screen, and then this error message:
System BIOS Version: V2.00
640K System RAM Passed
446M Extended RAM Passed
512 KB L2 Cache
System BIOS shadowed
Video BIOS shadowed
Fixed Disk 0: WDC1WD6p0UEm2rKUTp```````
Mouse initialized
ERROR
0200: Failure Fixed Disk 0
Press <F1> to resume, <F2> to Setup.
Upon pressing F1, I am given a repeating error message, which says:
For Realtek PCI Fast Ethernet Controller v2.13 (020326)
PXE-E61: Media test failure, check cable.
PXE-M0F: Exiting PXE ROM.
Upon pressing F2, I'm taken to the BIOS settings, I navigate to 'Exit and Discard Changes', which sends me back in a loop of the problem.
Recently, I sent this laptop back to Acer to be repaired. I received the laptop this afternoon when I arrived home, it functioned perfectly for an hour or so but then began to repeat the errors which I first sent it in for. Symptoms began showing again when my battery went flat after I plugged the laptop into my mains adapter. Acer suspected that a fault on the Hard Drive was causing my problems, however, they replaced it and I am still faced with the same troubles.
I'm running on Windows XP Home Edition SP2, does anyone have a clue what is wrong with this godforsaken machine? I've had my RAM tested, which is supposedly fine, and there's been no inherent trauma to the machine.
Thanks,
Michael.

 

Two Acer Aspires in one evening!!!!!

Have you also noticed overheating problems?

http://forums.majorgeeks.com/showthread.php?t=123538

Please also do the Everest thing.
Meanwhile you problem will take some thinking about, If Acer couldn't fix it - not that their repair track record is all that good.

Studio T

 

Been thinking about it some more,
I'm pretty sure the hard drive isn't trashed, even though googling for the "Fixed Disk Error 0" said that it meant it was. The reason being is that surely, the hard drive can't have been corrupted again after me having it back for just over an hour. I'd visited a few (legitimate, of course) websites, and downloaded MSN Messenger. The only thing I can think of is that my charger may be dodgy, could that have caused the hard drive to corrupt?
I had it tested before I sent it back to Acer, the guys in the shop seemed to think it was a motherboard fault, to me that makes more sense. If the hard drive ISN'T corrupt, and yet the motherboard thinks it is, that could cause some kind of problem right?
Now, I'm by no means a computer whizz, but this makes much more sense to me. After running Everest, my temperature was through the roof after leaving it alone for a few hours.
Anyone got any more ideas?
Perhaps a reformat? Acer never sealed the drive when they sent it back to me, MAYBE the charger corrupted files in Windows, which could be resolved if I reformatted. That's probably nonsensical, but just a shot. Problem is, I tried to reformat last time, and it crashed mid-way through reformatting which left me completely screwed, at least at the moment I can get on my laptop for a bit.

Michael.

 

find out from Everest what make your hard drive is and get the manufacturers test program here

http://www.asci-red.net/tools.htm

Secondly run microsft checkdisk on the drive.
Do this check from safe mode with no screensaver.

If either find problems and hopefully resolve them

Run the system file checker.

Studio T


This should sort out any drive problems

 

Cheers mate
Bit wary about booting it into safe mode, had bad experiences with it in which I couldn't get it out so I might leave it ^_^
It's on its way back to Acer tomorrow, though. Reckon they spend a lot of time on repair jobs, or do they just look for the easiest solution?

Michael

 

Better luck second time around.

BTW I only said safe mode because you need to run disk scanning processes with no other programs running, even in the background. In normal mode Windows XP will offer to do it next time you reboot (as previous versions used to).

Let us know the outcome


Studio T