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Desk top problems

Seek assistance with all types of tech. - computer, phone, TV, heating controls etc.
monabri
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Re: Desk top problems

#447751

Postby monabri » October 4th, 2021, 2:39 pm

Dell Optiplex SFF 9020, Intel i7-4770 3.40GHz, 8GB Ram, 512GB SSD, DVD, Windows 10 Professional Desktop PC Computer (Renewed)

An alternative suggestion - replace the desktop "box" .

Image

Breelander
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Re: Desk top problems

#447753

Postby Breelander » October 4th, 2021, 2:42 pm

Dod101 wrote:...I do appreciate all the helpful people here but i never seem to get past the stage that I am currently at...



By far the most important single bit of advice in this thread is to make a Macrium image of the disk now, while you still can.

A Macrium image can be mounted as a virtual drive. Keep this image safe, any/all of your precious files can be copied from a mounted Macrium image using File Explorer, so all your date will be safe.

BobbyD
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Re: Desk top problems

#447757

Postby BobbyD » October 4th, 2021, 3:06 pm

Breelander wrote:
Dod101 wrote:...I do appreciate all the helpful people here but i never seem to get past the stage that I am currently at...



By far the most important single bit of advice in this thread is to make a Macrium image of the disk now, while you still can.

A Macrium image can be mounted as a virtual drive. Keep this image safe, any/all of your precious files can be copied from a mounted Macrium image using File Explorer, so all your date will be safe.


If the drive is failing get an upto date copy of all the data off the drive first, then turn off the machine/unplug the drive and make alternative arrangements with a new drive or new box. Wasting time on the drive's death bed backing up windows files to an image the machine is very unlikely to be able to finalise is like using your last hours on earth to fill in next years tax return rather than playing with the grandkids...

...and its worth preserving the old drive if possible, just in case your back up isn't quite as through as you thought it was. If you discover you are missing a file you are surely far more likely to be able to successfully retrieve it remounting the old drive and ferreting it out than you are cloning a failing drive which is throwing out errors under the least provocation and mounting the image?

Midsmartin
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Re: Desk top problems

#447761

Postby Midsmartin » October 4th, 2021, 3:20 pm

Have you tried running any diagnostics on the hard drive?

Backup your data first, and then download and run the manufacturer's diagnostics.
I don't think it's too important that you even use the same manufacturer, but in device manager, under "disk drives", if the disk model starts with WD it's western digital, ST=Seagate, , H=hitachi
If possible pick the manufactuer, but if not use either of:
https://www.seagate.com/gb/en/support/d ... in-master/
https://support.wdc.com/downloads.aspx?lang=en&p=279

In both, you can try a short self-test which takes a couple of minutes, or a long self-test which does a read test on the entire drive, and can therefore take hours.
If these fail, then replace the drive. If they pass, the drive itself is most likely OK.

jfgw
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Re: Desk top problems

#447766

Postby jfgw » October 4th, 2021, 3:28 pm

Given that you have regular backups, how much have you got to lose?

If it is much, I would be inclined to remove the drive and install it as a second drive in another computer. This should allow files to be backed up and for a CHKDSK to be run without rebooting. You should be able to install it into a caddy and plug it into a laptop. Alternatively, get a new drive for your existing desktop and install Windows (or Linux) from scratch, then install your old drive as a second drive.

I would do the backup first before (potentially) losing data unless I had copies of everything I was not prepared to lose. Have you copied the files that were created or modified since the last backup? Do it now if you haven't. If the hard drive is failing, any continued use risks losing data. Hard drives are not like SSDs (which tend to work, then suddenly don't work) but they can suffer increasing numbers of bad sectors quite rapidly once they start to go.

After you have backed up your data, to get an idea of the health of your hard drive, you could download CrystalDiskInfo and look at the SMART diagnostics. https://crystalmark.info/en/software/crystaldiskinfo/


Julian F. G. W.

Dod101
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Re: Desk top problems

#447770

Postby Dod101 » October 4th, 2021, 3:36 pm

Thanks everybody. I have really had enough of it today, but will return to the fray soonest.

Can I just say though that I cannot get Macrium to acknowledge my Seagate Portable Drive. Their website has told somebody else with that problem that it may be a driver problem. I have tried plugging in both the portable drive and an empty USB stick, not at the same time!

Dod

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Re: Desk top problems

#447771

Postby Midsmartin » October 4th, 2021, 3:37 pm

You will need to restart Macrium after connecting the USB drive, if you didnt' try that.

mc2fool
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Re: Desk top problems

#447787

Postby mc2fool » October 4th, 2021, 4:24 pm

Dod101 wrote:Thanks everybody. I have really had enough of it today, but will return to the fray soonest.

Ok, but best to leave your desktop switched off in the interim. Any use of it just increases the possibility that the disk will go totally belly up sooner rather than later.

Dod101 wrote:Can I just say though that I cannot get Macrium to acknowledge my Seagate Portable Drive. Their website has told somebody else with that problem that it may be a driver problem. I have tried plugging in both the portable drive and an empty USB stick, not at the same time!

Oh great, another problem! :(

In any case, I suggest you, as others have suggested, get your personal data off ASAP, either onto a USB stick or the Seagate drive. It doesn't matter which, just get it saved!

Infrasonic
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Re: Desk top problems

#447788

Postby Infrasonic » October 4th, 2021, 4:35 pm

Dod101 wrote:Thanks everybody. I have really had enough of it today, but will return to the fray soonest.

Can I just say though that I cannot get Macrium to acknowledge my Seagate Portable Drive. Their website has told somebody else with that problem that it may be a driver problem. I have tried plugging in both the portable drive and an empty USB stick, not at the same time!

Dod


As suggested try restarting Macrium, if that doesn't work restart (cold boot) the PC. I believe W7 has hybrid fast start like W10, so restart should bypass that.
It's also possible that valid USB drivers aren't loading properly (corrupted) at boot due to the HDD issues.

monabri
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Re: Desk top problems

#447789

Postby monabri » October 4th, 2021, 4:41 pm

At times, one feels just like this about computers!


https://images.app.goo.gl/CXPFkY6W1vCXuvz77

Dod101
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Re: Desk top problems

#447810

Postby Dod101 » October 4th, 2021, 5:19 pm

mc2fool wrote:
Dod101 wrote:Thanks everybody. I have really had enough of it today, but will return to the fray soonest.

Ok, but best to leave your desktop switched off in the interim. Any use of it just increases the possibility that the disk will go totally belly up sooner rather than later.

Dod101 wrote:Can I just say though that I cannot get Macrium to acknowledge my Seagate Portable Drive. Their website has told somebody else with that problem that it may be a driver problem. I have tried plugging in both the portable drive and an empty USB stick, not at the same time!

Oh great, another problem! :(

In any case, I suggest you, as others have suggested, get your personal data off ASAP, either onto a USB stick or the Seagate drive. It doesn't matter which, just get it saved!


Thanks yes I know what you will be thinking and you may be right, that is me!

Dod

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Re: Desk top problems

#447935

Postby Dod101 » October 5th, 2021, 7:41 am

Having slept on the problem I have decided to remove as much as I need to from the desktop and transfer it to my laptop, I am in the midst of doing that anyway, and then abandon it pro tem anyway. I will get someone to take a look at it and most likely will strip it right down, and try a 'clean install' of W10 or as monabri has kindly suggested, maybe just go for a new tower with W10 or even W11!

For whatever reason I have had problems with it off and on for a long while. The difference and relief in using my laptop is incredible.

Again my thanks to all who have contributed to this thread. I am very grateful.

Dod

Infrasonic
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Re: Desk top problems

#447949

Postby Infrasonic » October 5th, 2021, 9:21 am

Even if you get a new tower with W11 it might still be worth fixing up the W7 box and keep it as a working up to date W10 spare that you can use to learn on wrt some of the more techie stuff. Or you could could turn it into a NAS box for instance - depending on the tower space and number of SATA ports up to a four drive one.

If you clean install W10 onto a new SSD without having taken the W7 to W10 free upgrade path first I'm not sure if the licensing will transfer across on the MS servers.

W10 will work without an activated license and it will update but obviously you'll get no support from MS.

You can get 'cheap' (£20ish) digital licenses online from reliable sources but I'd avoid any companies without a proper UK bricks and mortar presence - I normally do a companies house search and see what their trading history is like - the dodgy ones tend to have lots of previous trading names, company secretary/director changes, late filed accounts et al - the usual. :D

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Re: Desk top problems

#447956

Postby Urbandreamer » October 5th, 2021, 9:49 am

Infrasonic wrote:Even if you get a new tower with W11 it might still be worth fixing up the W7 box and keep it as a working up to date W10 spare that you can use to learn on wrt some of the more techie stuff. Or you could could turn it into a NAS box for instance - depending on the tower space and number of SATA ports up to a four drive one.


I second the idea of actually looking for a use for it and using it as a "free" resource to experiment upon.

I have an otherwise usless old HP computer that acts as a second NAS and blocks doddgy web requests. It's currently blocking 19% of web requests, a hell of a lot of microsoft, google and amazon telemetry.

As said it also provides somewhere to regularly back my data up to. Which of course happens automatically so that I don't need to remember to do it.

I would causion against thinking such things are difficult or beyound your abilities. The internet tells you how to easily do these things, and assuming that you do find it too difficult, what have you actually lost?

Infrasonic
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Re: Desk top problems

#447957

Postby Infrasonic » October 5th, 2021, 9:56 am

Urbandreamer wrote:I would causion against thinking such things are difficult or beyound your abilities. The internet tells you how to easily do these things, and assuming that you do find it too difficult, what have you actually lost?


YouTube has some incredible tutorials for technical stuff that I never would have attempted even a couple of years ago. For some reason videos sink in better than written instructions for me, mirror neurons or something...

Dod101
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Re: Desk top problems

#454370

Postby Dod101 » October 30th, 2021, 4:09 pm

I have I think solved my problem by buying a new machine very much to the spec recommended to Clariman for his new laptop. It is a Dell Inspiron and I am told it will upgrade in due course to Windows 11 if I want it. So far it is great, fast and positive. Obviously it will need some tweaks but I have transferred all the essentials to the new machine and am very happy with it. The tweaks can wait. My biggest problem at the moment is that I cannot remember my password for my email but never mind.

I am suddenly going mad, one week a new TV and the next a new PC!

Thanks for all the comments which helped me to focus my mind. I will now set up an automatic back up as well!

I will not get rid of the W7 box and will try to act on the comments from infrasonic in due course. I will in fact not touch it for a month or so to be certain that I have all the data I need from it.

Dod

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Re: Desk top problems

#454431

Postby stewamax » October 30th, 2021, 10:21 pm

DO take a backup - as others have emphasised
Going forward you could as an expedient (not a long term solution) simply buy a suitable disk caddy (£20), remove the disk from your Win 7 machine, insert it in the caddy, and plug the caddy in to your Win10 machine. You will then have an extra drive on the latter.

monabri
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Re: Desk top problems

#454474

Postby monabri » October 31st, 2021, 8:29 am

Dod101 wrote:I am suddenly going mad, one week a new TV and the next a new PC!
Dod


Your passport to enter Yorkshire has been revoked with immediate effect.
;)

AsleepInYorkshire
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Re: Desk top problems

#454544

Postby AsleepInYorkshire » October 31st, 2021, 11:50 am

Dod,

Have you been tinkering with your new toys?

My two girls love to watch TV. They read the books and watch the films. We have a large TV in the lounge - a gift to them from me. I still get to watch Star Wars and other sci-fi and it's like going to the cinema.

If you've gone down the large TV route (I bought one for Mum a coupe of years ago), may I suggest you get a sound bar for Christmas and put Harry Potter or Star Wars on and binge watch them :)

I know you like reading - I'm not a big fan because until diagnosis of my condition I would fall asleep within seconds of starting to read a book - but some stories just seem more suited to a big screen.

Hope you new laptop is up and running - it should be exceptionally fast - fast enough to free up more time to read and binge watch sci-fi :D

Take care

AiY

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Re: Desk top problems

#455914

Postby Dod101 » November 5th, 2021, 3:16 pm

Hi AiY

Not ignoring you but I have only just found your email. No I have gone for a modest 42 inch I think it is, TV plus a Freesat box and can thus chuck Sky which was getting to be a bit silly costwise. A soundbar would be a good idea though and I may do just that.

Dodf


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