24 replies to this topic

[Mini-Mad-Craig]

Exactly.

Your 2048 RAM is PHYSICAL, whatever you do to the HDD will not change that. You could stick any Harddrive in it and your RAM will stay the same because you have 2 PHYSICAL stick's of 1024 RAM in the laptop... So it's either been stolen, faulty socket or some BIOS setting's have been changed?

[Trail of Dead]

Exactly.

Your 2048 RAM is PHYSICAL, whatever you do to the HDD will not change that. You could stick any Harddrive in it and your RAM will stay the same because you have 2 PHYSICAL stick's of 1024 RAM in the laptop... So it's either been stolen, faulty socket or some BIOS setting's have been changed?

Good point about the BIOS settings.

[davidv]

Mmm Craig.If a system goes down with a drive i put them on slave and get back what i can on onother pc.Am i right on that guys.My PC has 4 front loading hard drives that edject if a problem themselfs with a liquid cooling system and a blue light that keeps things safe.Also does instant system remote rebuilds if system is attacked.Its a gold PRED.

[Trail of Dead]

Mmm Craig.If a system goes down with a drive i put them on slave and get back what i can on onother pc.Am i right on that guys.My PC has 4 front loading hard drives that edject if a problem themselfs with a liquid cooling system and a blue light that keeps things safe.Also does instant system remote rebuilds if system is attacked.Its a gold PRED.

Not sure I copy. You are correct in saying you can get back what you can from another PC, you can put the drive on slave BUT it the hard drive is really messed up it may make the host PC unstable during operation. Better off using an external case via USB/Firewire/eSATA. Not sure about the rest....I couldn't quite understand. Liquid Cooling, I understand.....everything else I didn't. Care to elaborate?

[davidv]

Yes above the design is quite new the 4 hard drives eject out the front of the tower.No need to open case.They are made by ACER in USA.If and when the operating system goes down it gets rebuilt free by remote online with a phone call.
Hope the laptop gets fixed free.Above has been waiting some time on this.

[xBR4DLEY]

Exactly.

Your 2048 RAM is PHYSICAL, whatever you do to the HDD will not change that. You could stick any Harddrive in it and your RAM will stay the same because you have 2 PHYSICAL stick's of 1024 RAM in the laptop... So it's either been stolen, faulty socket or some BIOS setting's have been changed?

Good point about the BIOS settings.

Thats not my fault if the settings have been changed though?
and with your other post ToD how is it my fault if they didnt install windows correctly when I payed them for it?
and yes after this I will do most of the stuff myself

[Trail of Dead]

Exactly.

Your 2048 RAM is PHYSICAL, whatever you do to the HDD will not change that. You could stick any Harddrive in it and your RAM will stay the same because you have 2 PHYSICAL stick's of 1024 RAM in the laptop... So it's either been stolen, faulty socket or some BIOS setting's have been changed?

Good point about the BIOS settings.

Thats not my fault if the settings have been changed though?
and with your other post ToD how is it my fault if they didnt install windows correctly when I payed them for it?
and yes after this I will do most of the stuff myself

Hey, I don't mean to get your feathers ruffled. Lets just be clear on this....you took the laptop to have the hard drive replaced right?

If the answer to the above question is "Yes" then my reply is as follows:

When you replace a hard drive most of the time you have to start over from scratch. I say "most of the time" as sometimes the old hard drive is able to be mirrored. In this case the old hard drive had bad sectors....now you could have possibly (if you were able to get into Windows) tried scanning the drive for bad sectors and attempted to repair them. Windows can do this if you so choose. Results may vary. So, since the hard drive couldn't be repaired (I'm assuming it's toast) then the only recourse was to install a fresh drive....in this case a 250GB 2.5" HDD (most likely SATA....but maybe IDE/PATA). Anyhow this meant Windows had to be reinstalled. So my point is you didn't mention in your initial post that you took it to the shop to have Windows reinstalled.....the initial fix was intended to be the hard drive...Windows being reinstalled is just a side effect of having a new HDD installed. So, in essence you paid them the replace the HDD not reinstall Windows right? If I am wrong I can take it....I can handle the truth. Let me know if I am wrong (or right). I just want to understand to help you out.

I'm not saying it was your fault.....I am simply saying that it doesn't sound like it was their's either.

Edited by Trail of Dead, 08 June 2010 - 04:45 PM.

[Mini-Mad-Craig]

That's it really. You gave it to them with a faulty harddrive, the content's of the HDD is up to you to deal with. They did what they were suposed to do and that was replace the HDD, it's then up to you to recover your lost files/reinstall your operating system.

[xBR4DLEY]

Ok , maybe I didnt make it very clear , their job was to install a new HDD and then re-install Windows - which it seems they didnt do very well as it is now invalid?
All my old programs where transferred over , but during the process I lost 1024MB of RAM?

[Trail of Dead]

Have you checked to see what RAM is actually in it yet? What kind of computer is this? I'm not sure how you would lose RAM....... It has nothing to do with the hard drive, totally separate thing here. BIOS settings can adjust the amount of system RAM is used to support the on-board GPU (which would in turn make some of the system RAM "disappear"), but that usually doesn't go any higher than 128MB (with most Laptops anyways....usually it is less!). Like I said before it sounds like a stick of RAM has either been stolen or it died. Seriously.....open the RAM cover and count the sticks of RAM.

Here is an example. Most Laptops have only room for two sticks, you said it had 2048MB of RAM or 2GB. Most OEMs only use smaller sticks to save money....so you'd end up with two 1GB sticks. I don't know if this RAM is something you added or you bought it like this. Did you buy it new or used? If it was used then maybe someone put a 2GB stick in it. So what this tells you:

1) If you open it up and see two sticks of RAM and both of them say 1GB or 1024MB on them then chances are one of them is dead. Process of elimination by removing then restarting Laptop (make sure it is OFF, unplugged and NO battery in it!!!). Whichever stick it won't start with is the dud.

2) If you open it up and it has two sticks that read 512MB then chances are some RAM got switched out......go back to the store and investigate.

3) If you open it up and see only one stick that reads 1GB or 1024MB again.....go investigate.

4) If you open it up and see one stick that reads 2GB or 2048MB then chances are the stick is half dead or the slot is starting to go out......

5) If you open it up try to re-seat the RAM as your first troubleshooting effort....again....DO NOT do this while it is ON or Plugged in or with a battery in it!!!!

What I am getting at is "Open this puppy up!!!"

As for the OS installation being invalid. Sometimes XP/Vista will do this when a major piece of hardware was changed. It is completely unavoidable and random it seems. Alot of times Gateways and Acers act REALLY strange after a major surgery.....Toshibas too. Like I said, go through the motions on the computer as if you are trying to activate it. It should give you an option to call customer support. Once you get the Indian person on the phone then tell them you installed a new hard drive, and reinstalled Windows.....but now it won't successfully activate. They will ask you to read the code displayed on your screen. Once you tell them the whole code they will then tell you a code to type into the boxes on the screen. Boom, your laptop is now activated. No issue there and no fee either.