My late departed Acer 5634wmli

Last night my Acer 5634wmli passed away.

It had been having problems for a number of months.

I had tried to install an XP webcam - and Vista didn't like it and sent me a message to say that it was closing down to protect itself.

When I tried to restart it, the Acer told me I would need to use the restore discs.

Now, originally the Acer came with Windows XP Media Centre version.. and was later upgraded to Vista on the free Vista upgrade programme.

However, the Recovery Discs I made with the Acer are for XP, of course - and the Acer would load them so far... but not continue with the restoration [because, of course, the hidden partition contained Vista, not XP].

So Acer wasn't having it. And each time I had to abort the instllation.

Later, Acer went a step further - and began to tell me that it could not find the operating system at all. A black screen appeared [DOS command prompt, I assume] saying 'No Operating System found'.

So my Acer has lain unused for several months [since I could not find the original Vista discs Microsoft sent].

I was awaiting Windows 7.

Well, Windows 7 arrived yesterday [a day early, thanks to Currys!].

And I tried to install it.

But during the installation, Windows 7 went through various dignified attempts to repair, restore or restart the Acer... eventually telling me that 'no hard disc could be found'.

Following this, almost immediately, the Acer would only switch on for a brief second before dying [with the battery inserted]. I assume this is because the battery has gone completely flat after not being used for months.

If I try to switch on without the battery installed, nothing happens at all.

And I have gone into a serious depression as a result. I am not joking.

I had thought I would be clever and avoid expensive repair costs for the Acer by waiting for Windows 7. Now, instead, I have an extra copy of Windows 7 and a dead laptop.

[It has occurred to me that the hard disc must have failed in some way along the line. Coupled with which, I see that the left-hand button on the touch pad has sort of broken - and requires several firm pushes before it connects.]

Oh dear!

This is a sob story.

Over the last few months, I have been using a Toshiba laptop [fairly similar in spec - but not quite as fast, no webcam, smaller L2 cache, and in the early days a number of software glitches - but, frankly, built better than the Acer - which I have come to think is fairly flimsy].

Cheer me up, guys.

What do I do?

I am not well off.

Where do begin?

 

sounds like you may need a nice simple hard drive replacement. grab a can of compressed air and blow out the vents, remove the old hard drive take a look at to verify if it is SATA and drop a new one in cheap and easy

 

uh, buy a new laptop?

 

if he can live with the touchpad button messed a little, id just find a used HDD and kick it in and go again for awhile