Fujitsu S6210 won't boot up after reformat

I have had this laptop for a numbers of years and love it. I have had a problem with when it boots up, it will flash to a blue screen telling me that I may have a hardware/software problem. It will typically do this once while booting up then operate normally. Occasionally it would do this several times and not boot up.

I decided to bring it back to factory specs. and reinstall XP to see if this would fix the problem, so I installed the Rescue disk. Now when it boots up, it will constantly flash to the blue screen and try to boot again. It will finally go to a screen asking me for "normal start or safe boot etc.

I don't know what to do from here. Can it be the hard drive, hard drive controller, the connector tape to the hd or ? I have and external HD if this helps in trouble shooting.

 

Usually, a normal start from here would fix any future problems. Just make sure you shut down properly from the Windows menu instead of interrupting it and shutting down by pushing the power button!

Your hard drive might need replacing if it has one of those smart features where it detects wear on your disk. If it is old enough, some information may be corrupted during write and when it tries to read it, it encounters a problem which could put the computer at the blue screen!

 

Is there a way to trouble shoot the hard drive. The Xp is loading correctly. I checked the drive for any problems. It didn't indicate anything bad.

What do I do now?
Thanks

 

GDief, check you RAM and make sure are correctly inserted. When you see the blue screen look there about the problem issues. There should says about physical memory or something like that. By the way, the HDD is not the problem for blue screens.

 

Copy down the BSoD and try googleing it.

Here is a link to some BSoD common errors

Tech Republic Article

 

The blue screen could be caused by the hard drive if it is trying to write to a defective drive. When the system reads back corrupted information and executes garbled codes instead of real data, it then crashes. I had a lot of programming back in my days so I know. Anyways... I am just saying that this could be one of the problems. It doesn't mean that this is actually what is the problem. If you have an old worn out hard drive like I had [it was about 10 years old], you will have to replace it. Sometimes, you can get second hand hard drives on craigslist for less than $25! You can check your hard drive thoroughly for errors please see the link: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/315265

I hope this helps. If it turns out that the hard disk is not the problem, then you can at least rule out buying another one!

 

I have the first one on the list. this has to do with:

IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL

What is this? I assume it's a writing error and not a HD problem? I will certainly check out the memory and follow up on the website Alltruth sent me. BTW, I just checked the website for the chkdsk. This assumes that I can boot up. I cannot. It will not allow me to fully boot up, it stops right after the windows screen.

Any more suggestions?

 

Reset the BIOS to factory default settings and see if that helps. Also disconnect any peripherals connected to the USB/firewire ports etc. before starting the lifebook.

If you're slightly more technically inclined I'd recommend grabbing an Ubuntu liveCD (google for it) and booting from it. Some of the things you can do with it (i.e. the CD) include a fairly detailed memory test, plus the ability to boot into an OS which does not use the HDD at all. This can further help trouble shoot your problem.

 

I don't quite know how to reset the BIOS although I thought this was being done when I hit the key to reset the computer to factory specs.

As for checking out Buntu, I will try to do that. Is this something to download and make a cd or ?

 

Hit the Del or F2 key when you see the FUJITSU splash screen and it will take you to the BIOS.

It certainly appears that you are unfamiliar with technical stuff, so I'd recommend contacting someone who knows these things better.

 

Excuse me but, how did you learn to do these things? It's been a long time since I have done any of these things. I've had enough so called experts telling me I have this or this when they are so far out the box. I prefer to try it myself in order to learn and fix it at the same time. The worst thing I do is take it in later. As for your answer Hit the del or f2 key. Yes I know how to find it, but what you didn't tell me is what to do with it. It is at original factory settings. I have checked the bios and it is 1.06 dated 2004. It may need an update, but without being able to reboot how do I do that?

Now, on the other hand I would like to thank you about the Ubuntu. I have actually downloaded (burned) the cd and used on this laptop. I have actually checked the memory and hard drive. There are no faults. I have installed the full version with a partition giving me half for the windows and the other half for Ubuntu. Ubuntu actually boots up and runs fine. The only thing I can't get working is the WLan. I have switched back to the Windows and it does not work, I get the same flash. Seems like I may have a bad installation disk. I may just install Ubuntu as a stand alone and or I'm looking to borrow someones XP disk.

 

My sincere apologies. I was only trying to play it safe. I've seen many folks who have no idea what they are doing and then they end up screwing the system and blaming others. Either way, it certainly looks like you are on top of things. Good Luck

PS: The WLan usually requires that you install the iwlwifi* microcode or such. Search in the ubuntuforums for your chipset.

 

I have decided to install Bunutu as a stand alone OS. It installed without incident. The wireless still does not work. It keeps asking me for the password. I will look at the forums for help.

I assume that my HD nor memory is bad. Everything works, so why does it now work with Windows (at least the disk I have)

Thanks again for you help and patience.

"I've seen many folks who have no idea what they are doing and then they end up screwing the system and blaming others". (I understand, no body seems to wants to take responsibilty for there actions) Ah, it's easier to blame someone else.

 

I had the same problem yesterday on Amilo Sa 3650 Windows 7 x64. My laptop was on sleep, i tried to wake it up, but unfortunately it didn't. I was trying to reinstall Windows 7 but no luck nether installation i couldn't do, on 8% comes blue screen by saying Bad Pool Header and some others messages. After i run e memtest, there was hell of errors. My DIMM was broken, i pull it out the broken one, and now work ok with one Dimm of 2GB.

 

I actually pulled out one of the memory sticks. It came up with a message that the OS was not installed. Very confusing.

I decided to reformat the disk one more time and install Ubuntu alone. It installed like I said without incident and I did find out what was the problem with the wireless connection. Now everything works as advertised.

It has not flinched yet. I may still get my friends copy of XP and see if it will load. I do like Ubuntu, but I haven't been able to load up Itunes yet?

 

HDD problem. put in another HDD and test it with new OS install. Sound like bad sector on HDD. But blue screen of death is hard to pin point.

 

I would say it's strongly a problem to pinpoint, although it's definetly not the HDD or the memory. I have a strong feeling that something is left on the hard drive after the reformat. I've since learned of the Nuke program that will get rid of everything. However, I have already installed Ubuntu running linux software. It installed and ran without incident. WTH, I'll keep the Ubuntu, very easy to use and I don't have to have security software, plus it comes with a nice word processing program. I'll be giving the computer to my son for school.

 

That's likely to be the case. Ubuntu "knows" how to correct format tables while Windows is weaker at this.
I had very similar problem with my IBM ThinkPad, It's probably all about the disk's magnetic tables becoming less stable for the algorithms used by windows OS, while linux uses slightly different algorithms and is able to avoid it. That's to put this in a simple way. I doubt you'll find any bad sectors on your HDD.