Wiping HDD on a laptop

[Pro]

Ok so my parent's gave me a laptop to fix, and I've encountered a problem I've never had before.

Laptop info:

When I boot up the laptop, it gives me the following error: A disk read error occurred press ctrl + alt + del to restart.

Great.

So I figured I tried wiping/clean installing to see if it works. I tried Windows Vista(Which came preloaded on the laptop before) and Windows 7. Both of which start "Loading Windows Setup files" but then ultimately give me a black screen (7 Gives me a black screen with a mouse cursor). I left it on overnight to see if anything changed, and nothing.

Any clues? Is the HDD fucked, and needs replacing? Could there be any other underlying issue?

They gave me the laptop because my brother apparently got a "virus" on it, then that D.R.E. screen came up. My dad said he tried to wipe/clean install it but ran into issues as well.

Thanks for the help in advance guys

[Mafai]

Ok so my parent's gave me a laptop to fix, and I've encountered a problem I've never had before.

Laptop info:

When I boot up the laptop, it gives me the following error: A disk read error occurred press ctrl + alt + del to restart.

Great.

So I figured I tried wiping/clean installing to see if it works. I tried Windows Vista(Which came preloaded on the laptop before) and Windows 7. Both of which start "Loading Windows Setup files" but then ultimately give me a black screen (7 Gives me a black screen with a mouse cursor). I left it on overnight to see if anything changed, and nothing.

Any clues? Is the HDD fucked, and needs replacing? Could there be any other underlying issue?

They gave me the laptop because my brother apparently got a "virus" on it, then that D.R.E. screen came up. My dad said he tried to wipe/clean install it but ran into issues as well.

Thanks for the help in advance guys

Look in the BIOs, is it displaying the hard drive info?

[Pro]

I'm in BIOS, and I see less options than I'm used to...I don't see any options for HDD...other than "Primary Hard Disk Self-Test". Which, I guess I should try out?

[Rellikard]

Sounds like a bad hard drive. If it's a Dell laptop, can press F12 @ Dell logo screen and go down to Diagnostic. Takes about 10-15min. to run but it'd conform that the HDD is bad. But either way, I think it's bad.

[Isiolia]

Sounds like a bad hard drive.

^

[Pro]

It's an HP Laptop... I ran the BIOS HDD Self Test, and it's been stuck on 90% for about 2 hours now. LOL...guess I'll look for a replacement HDD...Thanks guys

[bungiefan]

Disk read error usually means the hardware itself has a problem. Is it a Toshiba brand hard drive? I've seen more of those go bad on the machines I've worked on than anything else, and it was the number one repair I was doing on Toshiba laptops. Even on their own web store, their hard drives have an average of 1-2 stars out of 5 on customer reviews. I had 3 external hard drives of theirs go bad on me in under a year.

Guess I missed the last message saying it's an HP laptop, but I have seen Toshiba drives in some of the cheaper HP models.

[Mayareira]

Run diagnostics, chkdsk could also help but ultimately, a bad hard drive is a crappy situation. Couple of bad sectors wouldn't cause a major problem but they also wouldn't block the installation of an OS.

It depends on the model but HD replacement is generally one of the easier tasks that can be done on a laptop. I know Apple has its own documentation regarding tasks like these and probably many other companies as well.