I could be very bad and tell you that you have to go buy that big drive from Walmart and then rub it in by telling you that the terabyte computer drives are kept in a special location of all Walmart stores between the fat lady stretch pants and thongs department and the screaming baby in the shopping cart department but that would be unkind, not nice and kind rude. So I'll just giggle to myself and not say a word.

I've taken that as my wonderful and sparkling New Year's resolution. What? It's not New Years? Well that wasn't a resolution.

Dave (imported) wrote: Sat May 11, 2013 4:38 pm I could be very bad and tell you that you have to go buy that big drive from Walmart and then rub it in by telling you that the terabyte computer drives are kept in a special location of all Walmart stores between the fat lady stretch pants and thongs department and the screaming baby in the shopping cart department but that would be unkind, not nice and kind rude. So I'll just giggle to myself and not say a word.

I've taken that as my wonderful and sparkling New Year's resolution. What? It's not New Years? Well that wasn't a resolution.

Dave do not worry because I have no problem with plus sized models in stretch pants or children with healthy lungs. I choose not to give the Waltons any of my money. I also do not like how they treat employees and bully suppliers. I know some have to shop there but I can afford to support other stores.

How big is your current hard drive? Some motherboards can't handle but just so much. Do you know what type of MB you have? All you need to run WIN-7 with security is about 6 gigs, gives loads of operating memory. Store keepsakes and files off the PC onto a thumb drive or other storage device. If you are going to buy another hard drive, save to old one and use it as storage. Buy a desktop docking station (hard drive reader) [USB port]. Make sure it is not turned on, or plugged in before you try to load the new drive with the OS.

tugon (imported) wrote: Sat May 11, 2013 4:32 pm I am checking out Tiger Direct and wondered if there is an internal hard drive that is better than others?

Almost every manufacturer of hard drives had their bad series, so it is difficult to say what to choose. There are four major players: western digital, Samsung, Seagate and Hitachi. Avoid Seagate 7200.11 series, they have a bug in firmware, that has a potential to kill them. After that bug, I haven't bought any of Seagate drives.

Western Digital - they have 3 series: green, blue, black. Green is the slowest one, you should never use one as a system disk, black - fastest. (the faster the disk, the more heat it produces). There is also velociraptor series from WD, they are really fast, but hot too and not cheap.

Hitachi - I have rather recent experience with them (ultrastar series). They are fast, but hot and rather noisy (I got 3 of them for a RAID setup in home server, so I still don't know if being certified for 24/7 schedule was worth the noise).

Samsung - can't say anything about recent disks. The last ones I got were 400 and 500gb. Lived rather long life (4 years) in home server, but were preventively replaced due to increased error count.

That is my experience.

When choosing harddrive, you need to look at:

1. Interface, it should match the one you have on motherboard. (There are converters, but selecting the right disk is easier )

2. Disk rpm - more rpm=faster seek time, and so the faster it will work (but would generate more heat).

3. Manufacturer and series reputation (some series are notoriously bad with reliability/noise/vibration, etc)

Oh, and one more thing, if you computer case does not have it installed, look for a fan to place in front of hard drive, or it will overheat, and shorten it's lifespan. (anything below 40°c is okay, and you do not need much air flow, just a bit is usually enough.

ps. I may have missed things, so please correct and add if I missed/mistaken in something.

Thanks fhunter for the information. My case has multiple fans and from the dust I saw tonight it might pay to clean them regularly. I wonder if a buildup of heat caused premature death to the hardrive?

Fan? Fan?

I have an 8" clip fan blowing on mine (panels off) at all times that it's on.

Good luck with this, Tugon. We've always had good luck with Western Digital drives.

Paolo wrote: Sat May 11, 2013 6:05 pm Fan? Fan?

I have an 8" clip fan blowing on mine (panels off) at all times that it's on.

Good luck with this, Tugon. We've always had good luck with Western Digital drives.

Thanks for the brand suggestion. I wanted my hands in a computer as much as I wanted to be an amateur gynecologist. Of course if I can do it myself how pleased I will be. I see myself crying and begging for help.

Something I failed to mention was that when the computer was working Norton was popping up a lot to let me know they were handling the threats. I now wonder if one got past them. Before any surgery on the tower I think it needs checked for a virus.

A friends computer did something similar and would not boot up. He had a virus and they wiped his drive clean and reloaded his operating system. Does this sound like a possibility?

Tugon this might be very simple.

Remove the side panel, then look to the card that your monitor connects to.

Remove the cable to your pc that is connected to that card.

on the case there will be a screw that holds the card in, remove it.

carefully remove the card, then blow all the dust from around your pc in that area.

Take an eraser from the pencil on your desk and erase it along the golden strip that goes in the slot for that card thats in your hand.

Put the card back in you pc, and make sure it seats right,

Put the screw back in the top that holds the card in place.

plug in you cable that goes to the monitor

power up your pc and see if that works.

if not we will try something else.

let me know.

River

Just thought of something, when you have that card out look at it, do you see anything that looks like its burnt out? if so send me a message via this system with your phone number and I will give you a call.

something else you might try when the card is out,

Take the card to you kitchen and turn on the oven to 385 while its coming up to temp

make some aluminum foil and place it on a rack,

Take some more and make 4 little aluminum balls to put on the rack and place your card on those so you card is only touching those little balls you made,

bake the card for about 8 minutes then turn off the oven and open the door but DO NOT REMOVE THE CARD

Let it cool for 20 minutes or so

put it back in your PC and see what happens.

River