[BKsMassive]

so basically my mums computer (which is now 7 years old ) has had two WD hard drives in there in RAID0 and about 3 months ago one of them blew up. i reinstalled windows on the good one and took out the bad one

my mum has been complaining that its been getting slower and slower over the pas 3 months, i didn't think anything of it until i tried using it today. i timed it and it took 23mins to open google chrome! takes around 3 hours to start up the computer ready for uses from a cold boot.

i can only think of it being the hard drive and it must have a really slow write speed? can HHD degrade over time? this is 7 years old

i took all the computer apart and cleaned everything when i reinstalled windows and back then it works perfectly fine.

i know its something to do with hardware because im reinstalling windows 7 as we speak due to the computer not loaded past the splash screen and it was going for 2 days straight ( the windows logo was moving so it hadn't crashed.) and the windows installation has taken 8 hours and its only got to 3% complete.

do you think replacing the hard drive will stop this slowness?
and if so i will most likely get a SSD because my mum doesnt uses loads of space. will i need to update the BIOS to plug in an SSD? or will it be fine as long as i have some free SATA ports

Cheers for the help

Ollie

SPECS are as follows

- Intel Core 2 Duo E6400
- 2GB DDR2 RAM
- and a WD 250GB hard drive
- mobo is Philips own made

this computer was pretty high end when we got it 7 year ago xD

 

[TwoCables]

I've never used a RAID setup before, but I would assume that the death of the other hard drive harmed the one that's still being used. After all, look at how slow it is.

I bet that all you need to do is replace it with a new hard drive, and everything will be absolutely fine. Sure, an SSD might be better, but a good hard drive can be had for a fraction of the price. Plus, I think the only problem is that the computer is trying to deal with a messed up hard drive. So, replace the bad hard drive with a new one, and it should be all better.

 

[Ace Telekinesis]

Yes hard drives degrade over time and it sounds like this drive is going to fail like its partner did. If you download crystaldiskinfo then you can read smart information about the drive health to confirm this but really it should not take 23 mins for your browser to open. Getting an ssd will make your life a very happy one. After upgrading my system with one my windows boot times are around 9 seconds on average. But the downside is that they cost loads. Even my 40gb ssd cost me £90 so if you did go this route ud most likely find yourself buying another standard hard drive to put your bulk things on. That unless you can afford to splash out half a grand on a 256gb+ ssd.

Just one additional warning and clarification. You said your other drive "blew up" do you mean it just failed or was there some kind of burnt damage? If so then possibly you have a faulty psu and that may need changing too as installing any new drives may get damaged.

 

[BKsMassive]

Quote:

Originally Posted by TwoCables;12999910
I've never used a RAID setup before, but I would assume that the death of the other hard drive harmed the one that's still being used. After all, look at how slow it is.

I bet that all you need to do is replace it with a new hard drive, and everything will be absolutely fine. Sure, an SSD might be better, but a good hard drive can be had for a fraction of the price. Plus, I think the only problem is that the computer is trying to deal with a messed up hard drive. So, replace the bad hard drive with a new one, and it should be all better.

i wiped the BIOS of all RAID configs and all that
can the needle on the HDD wear away?
and yeah i know SSD are expensive but my mum has never used more than 30GB of space

so it comes down to getting a 1TB hard drive for £45~ or a 40GB SSD for £50~

 

[TwoCables]

That's what I mean: the other hard drive's death probably damaged the hell out of this one, so replace it and everything should be good again.

If you replace this HDD with a new one and if the issue persists, then either the cable is bad, or it could be the motherboard.

Quote:

Originally Posted by BKsMassive;12999989
i wiped the BIOS of all RAID configs and all that
can the needle on the HDD wear away?
and yeah i know SSD are expensive but my mum has never used more than 30GB of space

so it comes down to getting a 1TB hard drive for £45~ or a 40GB SSD for £50~

There's no needle. It's just a head that is just microns above the surface of the disk that never makes physical contact (it would be a disaster if it did).

Which 40 GB solid state drive can you get for £50?

 

[BKsMassive]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ace Telekinesis Yes hard drives degrade over time and it sounds like this drive is going to fail like its partner did. If you download crystaldiskinfo then you can read smart information about the drive health to confirm this but really it should not take 23 mins for your browser to open. Getting an ssd will make your life a very happy one. After upgrading my system with one my windows boot times are around 9 seconds on average. But the downside is that they cost loads. Even my 40gb ssd cost me £90 so if you did go this route ud most likely find yourself buying another standard hard drive to put your bulk things on. That unless you can afford to splash out half a grand on a 256gb+ ssd. Just one additional warning and clarification. You said your other drive "blew up" do you mean it just failed or was there some kind of burnt damage? If so then possibly you have a faulty psu and that may need changing too as installing any new drives may get damaged.

okay i will uses Crystaldiskinfo but it may take me a month of two to get it

and yeah really all my mum uses the computer for is word processing and playing farmville

no there was no burn damage but it doesnt even spin anymore and makes a really weird noise if plugged in, i will open it up tomorrow and see whats going on inside

would it be wise to buy a second and SSD off ebay or maybe this forum? can't SSD only write a certain amount of times?

 

[BKsMassive]

Quote:

Originally Posted by TwoCables That's what I mean: the other hard drive's death probably damaged the hell out of this one, so replace it and everything should be good again. If you replace this HDD with a new one and if the issue persists, then either the cable is bad, or it could be the motherboard. There's no needle. It's just a head that is just microns above the surface of the disk that never makes physical contact (it would be a disaster if it did). Which 40 GB solid state drive can you get for £50?

so how can it wear out if it never makes physical contact? or does the disk just wear out after times from being wrote on so much?

and £ is GBP not a euro not sure what country your from but most Americans think £ is a euro

on the Scan.co.uk website they have a cheap 40GB corsair SSD on there for £50

 

[MR KROGOTH]

Imagine writing something on paper with a pencil - you can only write, erase, write, erase so many time before you rip through the paper.

 

[BKsMassive]

Quote:

Originally Posted by MR KROGOTH;13000094
Imagine writing something on paper with a pencil - you can only write, erase, write, erase so many time before you rip through the paper.

yeah i understand now

i barely know anything about HDD and storage

 

[TwoCables]

Quote:

Originally Posted by BKsMassive okay i will uses Crystaldiskinfo but it may take me a month of two to get it and yeah really all my mum uses the computer for is word processing and playing farmville no there was no burn damage but it doesnt even spin anymore and makes a really weird noise if plugged in, i will open it up tomorrow and see whats going on inside would it be wise to buy a second and SSD off ebay or maybe this forum? can't SSD only write a certain amount of times?

Then she does not need a solid state drive. She'd even be happy with a Western Digital Caviar Green or Blue.

Just replace it with another hard drive and then see how that goes. If the problem persists, then you know you have to either replace the cable, or replace the motherboard.

Quote:

Originally Posted by BKsMassive so how can it wear out if it never makes physical contact? or does the disk just wear out after times from being wrote on so much? and £ is GBP not a euro not sure what country your from but most Americans think £ is a euro on the Scan.co.uk website they have a cheap 40GB corsair SSD on there for £50

The death of the other hard drive probably did some serious damage to the one she's still using.

It's not necessary to understand how it was damaged or how anything works: the other one "blew up" while both of these drives were in RAID 0 right? Well, so then the one you're still using was probably seriously damaged. After all, let's consider its current behavior!

So just run out to the store and get any Western Digital hard drive and try it out (throw this bad one in the trash!). If it doesn't fix the problem, then you know that you either have a bad cable, or perhaps a bad motherboard.

Getting a solid state drive right now would be a big waste of money.

 

[BKsMassive]

Quote:

Originally Posted by TwoCables;13000144
Then she does not need a solid state drive. She'd even be happy with a Western Digital Caviar Green or Blue.

Just replace it with another hard drive and then see how that goes. If the problem persists, then you know you have to either replace the cable, or replace the motherboard.

The death of the other hard drive probably did some serious damage to the one she's still using.

It's not necessary to understand how it was damaged or how anything works: the other one "blew up" while both of these drives were in RAID 0 right? Well, so then the one you're still using was probably seriously damaged. After all, let's consider its current behavior!

So just run out to the store and get any Western Digital hard drive and try it out (throw this bad one in the trash!). If it doesn't fix the problem, then you know that you either have a bad cable, or perhaps a bad motherboard.

Getting a solid state drive right now would be a big waste of money.

shes like level 130 something in farmville the amount of chickens she has lags even my desktop

but yeah i will see if i can find an old HHD

i will try a new cable as sell, for some reason the PC came with really nice Red Lian Li SATA Cables

Thanks for all your help guys

+1 for everyone

 

[TwoCables]

Right now, it unfortunately doesn't matter where she's at in Farmville. The current hard drive could "blow up" at any time now.

So I say just replace it with a brand new one from the local store, and then the problem should be solved. However, if that doesn't solve it, then it's either the cable or the motherboard.

I would buy the lowest-priced Western Digital hard drive you can find. She'll be happy with anything right about now.

 

[andrewmchugh]

Quote:

Originally Posted by BKsMassive;13000203
shes like level 130 something in farmville the amount of chickens she has lags even my desktop

lul xD, make her a program to auto click and harvest like a boss.

Try disabling all the windows crap, write cache..

and a smart defrag to sort out the messy windows install.

EHH> After reading everything above sounds like the drives failing.. is it clicking like mad?

Scan.co.uk have some good value drives in with high caches,

or try one of these hybrids

 

[Nemesis158]

Sounds to me more like there is a virus on it.
playing farmville definitely wont help there.....

 

[TwoCables]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nemesis158;13002321
Sounds to me more like there is a virus on it.
playing farmville definitely wont help there.....

Yeah, but it's been happening ever since the other hard drive "blew up" while both were in a RAID 0 configuration.

 

[Nemesis158]

then yeah you should check S.M.A.R.T. with crystaldiskinfo, and replace the drive.
SSD is not needed, any new HDD will operate fast enough for everyday tasks....

 

[ZealotKi11er]

SSD will make a fast computer feel faster but not make a slow computer fast. a good HDD with high transfer speeds like WD Black, Samsung F3, Seagate 7200.12 should help a lot.