hard drive wont start up windows

so i have this hp computer from around the year 2000 or so, and it worked great, and was upgraded from Win ME to Win XP about 6 years ago. About 1 year ago it stopped working though, when my mom was using it, and because it was in my east coast place i did not have a chance to look at it (me being on the opposite coast).



However, I finally got the computer today and noticed that the hard-drive fails to boot. I set it up as a slave drive on another computer, and I can access all the documents and all the program files and all that good stuff on the slave drive, with the master drive starting up Win XP



So im just wondering, is the hard drive bad, or did some aspect of windows go bad?



I don't think windows would randomly go bad like that lol, but I don't know. THe computer worked great for about 6 years, both before and after the Win uprade.



So yeah , I was thinking of going out and buying a hard drive to replace this one, and then use my external one to back up all of the stuff on the faulty hard drive and then transfer it on to my new hard drive.



Is that the right path to take?

Thanks in advance for help

The average lifespan of a hard drive is 3 to 5 years, so you are past the average. I would download a hard drive diagnostic tool from the drive manufacturer's website, and see if it passes or fails.

Regardless of the results of the test I would look at making regular backups of my data, and - given the drives age - probably look at getting a new drive.

alright cool



so now lets say i get this new hard drive



how would i go about loading win xp onto the new drive?

Would i have to buy it again, or should i be able to load Win ME on with cd's that the computer came with, and then run cds to upgrade it to Win Xp?

Yes, you can reload what you already have.

thank you very much, will buy a new hard drive/ do all the stuff to it

could you guys help me pick out a hard drive though? It doesn't need to be anything too fast, as it will go into a not-so-fast computer. Also, it does not need that much volume, 80gb is fine, but i would like it to be durable and last

70-80USD is my budget, thanks

EDIT: Oh yeah the mobo does not have SATA, just (the long one lol, i think its called IDE)

how about this one?.... less than 50 bucks with shipping.





http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822144122

oh so the long one is called ATA. . . xD

that looks like a solid choice, is there any risk when it comes to buying OEM though?

Nope. With OEM, you just don't get the retail box, papers, and hardware that come with a retail drive. Same warranty applies as retail drives.