Can't detect two HDDs

[gritty]

Last year I bought an HP DV7-6135DX Notebook. About two days after my freaking warranty expired, my now ex boyfriend, punched my laptop out of anger. He hit it right in the center of the closed lid. I was playing Skyrim (but I closed the lid because he was getting pissed) at the time and it didn't turn off, but it wouldn't respond, so I restarted it.

When I did, a command prompt box popped up and all I could understand from it was ' REM couldn't perform the screening because couldn't detect t HDDs on this system'

I've hit F10 at start up and ran the Primary Hard Disk Self test and got "HARD DISK 1 QUICK" (303)

The memory test passed

I was told by numerous people that I would have to replace the hard drive, but since I don't have my warranty anymore, I'm hoping that's all that needs to be done. But I guess I won't know until I get a new one, right?

I'm sorry I'm not the most tech savvy person when it comes to things like this T.T

Also, say I get a new hard drive and I install it. I was told that I can use the recovery discs that came with my laptop to install windows7, is this true?

EDIT: I don't know if this helps or not but...

OS Name: Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium
System Model: HP Pavilion dv7 Notebook PC
System Type mad 64-based PC
Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-2410M CPU @ 2.30GHz, 2301 Mhz, 2 Core(s), 4 Logical Processor(s)
Installed Physical Memory (RAM): 8.00 GB
Video Card: Radeon HD 6490M

[Minion4Hire]

Star Stealing Giirl

I've hit F10 at start up and ran the Primary Hard Disk Self test and got "HARD DISK 1 QUICK" (303)

[...]

I was told by numerous people that I would have to replace the hard drive, but since I don't have my warranty anymore, I'm hoping that's all that needs to be done. But I guess I won't know until I get a new one, right?

Your hard drive is failing/failed. That's what that 303 error means. You definitely need to replace it if you want to keep using the laptop.

Star Stealing Giirl

Also, say I get a new hard drive and I install it. I was told that I can use the recovery discs that came with my laptop to install windows7, is this true?

The recovery discs don't actually come with the laptop. You have to burn them yourself. Maybe you paid someone to do it for you when you bought the laptop, but pretty much since Vista came out they stopped including discs with computers.

If you're concerned that your ex-bf broke something I wouldn't be. He would've broke the LCD if anything, and if that is working fine I would breath easy if I were you. Just replace your hard drive and you'll be fine. Replace it with a spiffy SSD if your storage demands aren't to high (as they're not cheap); the performance difference between SSDs and HDDs is somewhat staggering really. Your computer will feel as fast or faster than anything else on the market just by installing an SSD.

[gritty]

Minion4Hire

You have no idea how happy you just made me. It's such a huge relief to know that he didn't break anything else.

EDIT: I dug out my box today and there are four recovery discs in there.

Also, how do I find out what kind of HDD or SSD that I need? I bought it specifically so I could play Skyrim and Diablo 3, so other than it handling those types of games, I don't need too much else. I don't even know if that has anything to do with it ^^'

I looked them up and they are so, so beautiful sounding, but really expensive. I think for right now I have to stick to HDD at least until after the holidays.

Though, my brother's friend suggested this; Hybrid

I found out that replacing a harddrive is pretty simple, so I want to do it myself instead of paying the Geek Squad to do it since they screwed up my case pretty bad the last time I had to take it in. I'm just not sure about installing the OS once I do replace it.

Thank you so much for your help, I'm so elated. I apologize if you were quoted a million times, I had to edit this reply.

[neodraconum]

it might be possible that when he hit your laptop the hard drive became loose. Take the hard drive out then replug it back in and scan it to test it. if you're buying a new hard drive, get a 2.5" SSD. check newegg and the reviews of what people said about the hard drive

[gritty]

neodraconum

it might be possible that when he hit your laptop the hard drive became loose. Take the hard drive out then replug it back in and scan it to test it. if you're buying a new hard drive, get a 2.5" SSD. check newegg and the reviews of what people said about the hard drive

Yeah, I tried plugging it back in but it didn't work.

[Minion4Hire]

Star Stealing Giirl

Minion4Hire

You have no idea how happy you just made me. It's such a huge relief to know that he didn't break anything else.

EDIT: I dug out my box today and there are four recovery discs in there.

Also, how do I find out what kind of HDD or SSD that I need? I bought it specifically so I could play Skyrim and Diablo 3, so other than it handling those types of games, I don't need too much else. I don't even know if that has anything to do with it ^^'

I looked them up and they are so, so beautiful sounding, but really expensive. I think for right now I have to stick to HDD at least until after the holidays.

Though, my brother's friend suggested this; Hybrid

I found out that replacing a harddrive is pretty simple, so I want to do it myself instead of paying the Geek Squad to do it since they screwed up my case pretty bad the last time I had to take it in. I'm just not sure about installing the OS once I do replace it.

Thank you so much for your help, I'm so elated. I apologize if you were quoted a million times, I had to edit this reply.

Hybrid drives are better than no SSD, but their biggest problem is inconsistent performance. They don't have a large enough SSD cache to allow all of your apps, OS, etc to reside within the SSD portion. So some programs will load faster, but then others will load "normally". But the second program will bump the first one out of cache, so the next time you load the first app, it will load more slowly.

Once you get a taste of how fast applications could be opening, you'll want that performance on everything. The problem of course is that although your overall experience will be faster, it could also become more frustrating since that performance is less consistent.

In short, Hybrid drives aren't bad, but they're a poor substitute for a proper SSD.

Also worth noting - some "Recovery" programs (like your HP discs) don't like hybrid drives. Couldn't tell you why, but I've seen instances where the recovery would not run on a hybrid drive. So it might be safer to just go with a hard drive (unless you're okay with exchanging the hybrid drive if you encounter problems).

Using the recovery discs are easy. With a new, blank hard drive, power on your computer, pop in the first disc, then restart. It will automatically boot from the recovery media. Then you should see a "Factory Reset" option. Click that and insert the other discs (2 of 4, 3 of 4, etc) when prompted. It will tell you to restart again once it has finished. Then it will go through its own little setup process. Could take upwards of an hour to finally get into the OS again (even after the restore) depending on the model of your computer. Some of HPs older recovery solutions were kinda slow.

[gritty]

Minion4Hire

Star Stealing Giirl

Minion4Hire

You have no idea how happy you just made me. It's such a huge relief to know that he didn't break anything else.

EDIT: I dug out my box today and there are four recovery discs in there.

Also, how do I find out what kind of HDD or SSD that I need? I bought it specifically so I could play Skyrim and Diablo 3, so other than it handling those types of games, I don't need too much else. I don't even know if that has anything to do with it ^^'

I looked them up and they are so, so beautiful sounding, but really expensive. I think for right now I have to stick to HDD at least until after the holidays.

Though, my brother's friend suggested this; Hybrid

I found out that replacing a harddrive is pretty simple, so I want to do it myself instead of paying the Geek Squad to do it since they screwed up my case pretty bad the last time I had to take it in. I'm just not sure about installing the OS once I do replace it.

Thank you so much for your help, I'm so elated. I apologize if you were quoted a million times, I had to edit this reply.

Hybrid drives are better than no SSD, but their biggest problem is inconsistent performance. They don't have a large enough SSD cache to allow all of your apps, OS, etc to reside within the SSD portion. So some programs will load faster, but then others will load "normally". But the second program will bump the first one out of cache, so the next time you load the first app, it will load more slowly.

Once you get a taste of how fast applications could be opening, you'll want that performance on everything. The problem of course is that although your overall experience will be faster, it could also become more frustrating since that performance is less consistent.

In short, Hybrid drives aren't bad, but they're a poor substitute for a proper SSD.

Also worth noting - some "Recovery" programs (like your HP discs) don't like hybrid drives. Couldn't tell you why, but I've seen instances where the recovery would not run on a hybrid drive. So it might be safer to just go with a hard drive (unless you're okay with exchanging the hybrid drive if you encounter problems).

Using the recovery discs are easy. With a new, blank hard drive, power on your computer, pop in the first disc, then restart. It will automatically boot from the recovery media. Then you should see a "Factory Reset" option. Click that and insert the other discs (2 of 4, 3 of 4, etc) when prompted. It will tell you to restart again once it has finished. Then it will go through its own little setup process. Could take upwards of an hour to finally get into the OS again (even after the restore) depending on the model of your computer. Some of HPs older recovery solutions were kinda slow.

Alright then, I'll just go with an HDD until I can get an SDD which sounds pretty sweet.

Thank you so much! You just saved me a ton of money and a lot of heartbreak!