Old laptop (~'97ish) C drive read problem

[n0b0dy]

The laptop brand is a Tecra but the BIOS screen displays the title Toshiba, however. When the system boots up it goes through the BIOS diplsays and such, then starts to load the Windows 95 boot screen ***. After this, it comes up with a C drive read disk error. I can just abort it to come up with a DOS command line. However, I can't do much because when ever I punch something in & hit the enter key it just gives me the first message again!

I'm so frustated. I tried formatting the drive, didn't work. C drive read disk error! Should I try making a boot disk for Windows 95 on a floppy? I don't see how this can help an incapable HDD. It's not my laptop & the owner has told me he left it in his vehicle for 3 days & nights in the near freezing weathers where I live (NorthEastern US).

*** The laptop (previous to these problems) had Windows 95 installed on it as it's primary (and only) operating system.

Now my question regarding ***

Why the heck would even frozen hardware (could be bent out of shape from hot to cold weather & such?) change the OS on the machine? Could this maybe be a boot record problem? Corrupt files therefore resorting to the previous configuration??! This doesn't seem very plausible, I'm running out of ideas here.

How difficult will replacing the HDD (if need be) be, finding it, prices, etc. ?

Thanks ahead of time [H]ard [H]obbyists

n0b0dy

 

[ImaRootofALLEVIL]

hard drives have a temprature rating for a reason

laptop drives can be come by easily (newegg) and replaced even easier

 

[NecessaryEvil]

honestly, go ebay for a new drive. for a system that old, it's not worth putting much (effort) into it.


And Toshiba makes the Tecra. it's like Dell's Inspiron, or Compaq's Presario, or HP's Pavilion.

Tecra is their business line, IIRC

 

[0ldman]

make a boot disk, make sure Win9x scandisk is on there and see what you can do with the drive.

Spinrite has worked wonders for me.