Opinion question, wait patiently or throw a Hail Mary?

[csdude55]

Recently, my Dell 2-in-1 thought it would be funny to add some stress to my life. Long story short, I can't boot Windows unless I dance 3 times in a counter-clockwise direction while shaking a stick, but only if the computer likes it.

Last night I was able to get Windows to load for the first time in about a week. There was no Start menu or clock, I couldn't get to Windows settings or anything, and Notepad wouldn't open. But I COULD get to Windows Explorer, so I backed up what I could to a USB drive. I specifically copied all of my web design files, Filezilla and Putty (which I hope saved the data in there), and Users\Me\Local\Microsoft\Outlook (which I hope saved all of my Outlook data). Then overnight the computer restarted, and now I can't get back to Windows.

I really don't know if the issue is with Windows, the hard drive, or possibly the CPU. All of the hardware scans SAY that the hardware is OK, but I can't explain why it rebooted overnight if the problem is software.

Dell is sending me a replacement 2-in-1 (a like-new refurb), but it "may" take 10-12 business days! It might come in Friday, or it might come in February...

So now I'm working on my old Windows 7 laptop that's suuuuuper slow.

Here's my question.

Since I'm about 90% sure I have everything important backed up, would you:

A. Reinstall Windows, and if everything looks good then restore backups and cancel the replacement; or

B. Don't do anything, get minimal work done for the rest of the month (more or less), and when the replacement comes in definitely have the old hard drive that you could use to restore any backups you missed.

If the problem is really just software, then option A might save me several weeks of not getting anything done. But if it's hardware then all it will accomplish is making me lose my secondary backup.

What would you do?

[tangor]

DO THIS FIRST!
Boot windows into safe mode, restore to the last known restore point your system was working, allow that to complete, then reboot system and see what happens.

[csdude55]

Unfortunately I've done that a few times, and no go :-( Dell has a Support Assist that has a "Reset" option, too, and that hasn't helped either. I went through every option that's offered, and a Dell tech remoted in and did the same thing, but nothing worked.

When I did finally get in to Windows, I ran Powershell and then sfc /scannow. At the 15% mark it returned:

Windows Resource Protection found corrupt files but was unable to fix some of them.

That wrote about 34 pages to an error log, but I don't know enough about Windows for any of it to make sense. Best I can tell, though, either the BIOS update unregistered a bunch of Windows files... OR the hard drive itself is bad.

If the problem is software related then a reinstall should fix it, and I wouldn't (necessarily) need the replacement... I could be back to work tomorrow! But if it's hardware related then a reinstall wouldn't help, and I'd just be left without the secondary backup. I honestly have no idea which one is the real troublemaker.

[brotherhood of LAN]

I'd get a USB drive and put a Linux installation on it, get an external HDD and boot into Linux, copy everything over to the HDD.

Maybe even split the HDD into two partitions, half for your data copy and half for installing Linux on there, boot it up and see if that runs smoothly.

With the USB you should at least be able to run some diagnostics on the disk, memory etc.

[engine]

BOL has a good idea, and it's fine if you want to keep messing with the machine.

It might be a Friday afternoon machine, or it could be faulty memory.

I'd look at the time involved in doing this and do a quick summary to see if it's cheaper to get a brand new machine, either through warranty, or even just buy new and ditch this machine. Your productivity would have taken a nosedive and it may be more cost-effective to move on.

[csdude55]

Dell is actually sending me a replacement 2-in-1 (a like-new refurb), but it "may" take 10-12 business days! It might come in Friday, or it might come in February... but when it does come in, I have to return the existing machine within 10 days.

The debate I'm having in my head, though, is that if it's a software issue then a reinstall today might solve all of the problems and I'll be back to normal within a few hours. But if I'm wrong and it's a hardware issue, the reinstall would accomplish nothing but erasing my full backup.

I was originally going to buy a new hard drive, then copy it all over. But with Windows not booting I don't know of a way to do that without removing it from the machine... which would then void the Dell warranty :-(

[csdude55]

I'd get a USB drive and put a Linux installation on it, get an external HDD and boot into Linux, copy everything over to the HDD.

I was thinking about this last night.

I haven't done this before, and I'd need to buy a 1TB drive to back up everything on the old computer AND have room for Linux. So before I do that, I want to make sure that I understand the steps.

You're saying that I can download a Linux installation to a USB drive on one of my old-but-functional machines, then connect this new external HDD to the functional machine and install Linux on it?

Then I can connect that external HDD to the faulty machine and (somehow) get it to boot from the external drive, recognizing the faulty installed drive as a slave? And then I could just copy files from the slave to the external.

I'm loving the idea, and I'm pretty sure that I can figure out how to install Linux on the external drive without affecting the internal drive. I'm just not 100% sure how to get the faulty machine to boot from the external instead of the internal.

Also, which version of Linux should I install? I used to have Mandrake because it was a relatively small install, but that was a looooooong time ago!

[brotherhood of LAN]

That's more or less it. Installing Linux ono the exthdd is entirely optional.

Go with any version of Linux, AFAIK there's easy steps for creating a bootable USB with Ubuntu/Debian/Mint. Once you have the installation on there you may need to change the boot priority in your BIOS so that the USB is looked at before the faulty OS on disk.

On reboot you'll have the option to 'try before you install' and have a fully working OS sitting on the USB. You'll be able to see the filesystems on the hard disk and ideally, copy the contents of them over to the external HDD.

The main drawback is using the USB version can take a while to boot, but you'd have the choice of installing it to disk if you wanted to.

You'll also be able to do a health check on the disk.

Of course, this might not work if there's a hardware issue, hopefully the disk is OK for copying its contents. FWIW use the `cp` command in a console to copy stuff over, you'll fine it a lot quicker than using the UI.

I bought a 2TB drive a couple of years ago for £60 (about $85). Good to have one for backups. I tend to keep a USB with an OS on it for these kinds of situations.

[thecoalman]

If you have a disc drive there is other options like Knoppix. If I recall correctly the HDD by default is read only.

Off topic but one great tip I received years ago was using it for sensitive sites like banking. Since the CD/DVD can't be written to the OS and applications are impervious to persistent virus/malware. Everytime you boot it's like a clean install. Downside is you can't update without writing a new disc.