Inspiron 1521 hard drive

osorioj · 12-10-2008, 01:52 PM

My laptop froze and I forced a reboot (unpluged and removed battery) now the laptop does not recognize the hard drive.

**simpswr** · 12-10-2008, 02:22 PM

and welcome to the Forum

When you say laptop does not recognize the hard drive, does BIOS recognize it ??

The drive may have failed . . do you have the Dell diagnostic cd that came with the pc? You can run that to test the drive. If you do not have it, you can download diagnostics from the Dell support site.

osorioj · 12-10-2008, 11:50 PM

Yes the BIOS did not recognized my hard drive. I searched on Dell's support for the diagnostic CD and got the idea to check the configuration on my laptop using the service Tag number. My hard drive is a Seagate Momentus 5400.3 SATA
model ST9160821AS. Then I checked on Seagate's web page for support and they have this disk tool that you can download into a ISO CD. I boot my computer using this program to check for the condition on my drive and after the second try, when reboot my laptop BINGO! the laptop recognized the hard drive and Vista booted properly. I am going to make a back up of all my important files before anything else happens.
Thanks for the advise, I am glad I register on this site, and I know I will be using it frecuently.

**simpswr** · 12-11-2008, 06:24 AM

Once you have the data backed up, I'd check the drive for errors. Right click on the drive in Computer . . select Properties . . Tools . . put a check in both boxes have it check for errors on the next boot

12-10-2008, 01:52 PM	#1 (permalink)
osorioj Registered User Join Date: Dec 2008 Posts: 2 OS: vista home premium (sp1)	Inspiron 1521 hard drive My laptop froze and I forced a reboot (unpluged and removed battery) now the laptop does not recognize the hard drive.

12-10-2008, 02:22 PM	#2 (permalink)
simpswr Moderator Hardware Team Join Date: May 2007 Location: Houston, Texas Posts: 8,936 OS: XP, Vista	Re: Inspiron 1521 hard drive and welcome to the Forum When you say laptop does not recognize the hard drive, does BIOS recognize it ?? The drive may have failed . . do you have the Dell diagnostic cd that came with the pc? You can run that to test the drive. If you do not have it, you can download diagnostics from the Dell support site. __________________ Rich MemTest86 \| BenchTest \| Virus/Trojan/Spyware Help \| How to Post a Screen shot \| PC running slow?]

12-10-2008, 11:50 PM	#3 (permalink)
osorioj Registered User Join Date: Dec 2008 Posts: 2 OS: vista home premium (sp1)	Re: Inspiron 1521 hard drive Yes the BIOS did not recognized my hard drive. I searched on Dell's support for the diagnostic CD and got the idea to check the configuration on my laptop using the service Tag number. My hard drive is a Seagate Momentus 5400.3 SATA model ST9160821AS. Then I checked on Seagate's web page for support and they have this disk tool that you can download into a ISO CD. I boot my computer using this program to check for the condition on my drive and after the second try, when reboot my laptop BINGO! the laptop recognized the hard drive and Vista booted properly. I am going to make a back up of all my important files before anything else happens. Thanks for the advise, I am glad I register on this site, and I know I will be using it frecuently.

12-11-2008, 06:24 AM	#4 (permalink)
simpswr Moderator Hardware Team Join Date: May 2007 Location: Houston, Texas Posts: 8,936 OS: XP, Vista	Re: Inspiron 1521 hard drive Once you have the data backed up, I'd check the drive for errors. Right click on the drive in Computer . . select Properties . . Tools . . put a check in both boxes have it check for errors on the next boot __________________ Rich MemTest86 \| BenchTest \| Virus/Trojan/Spyware Help \| How to Post a Screen shot \| PC running slow?]