Is this a hardware issue?

[Computerloser]

Ok my computer started acting up with various error messages that would not close. Eventually this turned into programs that started closing themselves, and i do mean closeing not crashing. Well i got sick of it and did a destructive restore to my computer. When it finished setting back up the first thing i did was to try and set up Norton which my computer came with. Well about half way through the pre-install setup, the part where you aggree to the EULA and other such stuffs before the actuall install, i would get the self closing problems starting again. 2 dialog boxs would appear asking me if i was sure i wanted to cancel setup before installation was complete. Well i figured taht if the problem was still there after the destructive restore that the virus/problem had somehow affected my recovery partition. So i gritted my teeth and whiped my HDD completly. Manually formatted and re partitioned everything. Reinstalled my OS and the problems are still there. No clue where to go from here. It is starting to look more like a hardware issue to me, but thats just because I have gone through all the things i can think of to fix a software issue. please can someone help me?

[Greg]

Sounds like a Norton issue. I hate those products. Wish I had a suggestion.

[Computerloser]

I thought so at first too, but if it was a norton issue 1) why wasnt it there for the first year of my computers life and 2) after i repartitioned and installed the os the problem was still there and closing things on me. it doesnt just close norton things but i was useing that as an example since it showed that it was closing stuffs and not crashing.

[lmnobs]

It could be an embedded file on the hard drive causing this ;which can not be removed by a normal reformat . There are progs you can buy to do a better job however ya can get another drive nearly for the same price . I am unaware of any free progs that will do the job needed to totally wioe the drive by overwriting everything a hundred or more times but you might do a Google search for one .

[Greg]

Ah yes, that made me think. Is your re-install actually wiping out the drive or meerly trying to overwrite the existing system? It sounds to me like it's trying to overwrite, not start from scratch.

[Computerloser]

honestly i dont know if it overwrote or what. to format all i did was toss fdisk and a few other files onto a 3 1/2in disk and used that to reformat and partition everything. would that be a true format or just an overwrite? or do you need more info

[Zero Tolerance]

did you remove the partition? Or just format? I always remove the partition....recreate a partition and format.

The only way to wipe the contents of a hdd is to do a low level format. And doing so could render the drive useless if something were to go wrong.

Like nobs said....the cheapest most practical way to get around an imbedded file that removing the partition and reformatting wont correct...is to trash the drive and buy a new one.

[Computerloser]

Yeah i did remove the old partition. i first deleted all logical partitions, then the extended partition, and then the main partition and then proceeded to recreat them. i hope i dont end up haveing to buy a new hd. but on that subject got a question if i do. I recently bought an external Western Digital 320gig HD, would i be able to use that?

on a side not after i posted this i looked for anything that could mess with imbedded files and came accross a program called universal explorer. i would post the url but the page is selling the program so i can't. It does say that one of its features is to edit imbedded files. Would this type of program be something that 'may' help to get rid of my problems if it is indeed an imbedded file? and how would i go about checking to see if it is actually an imbedded file.

[Zero Tolerance]

That app may work...wont know until you try.

I would format the drive and then scan it with the app b4 you install anything on it. It should detect if its an app to do such a thing.

As far as the external drive. I am not familiar with alot of the new external drives....but I would assume that inside of the exteran enclosure...there would be a regular drive inside. However unless there is some type of bootup chip/board inline....the drive may contain some type of driver so that the USB would recognize itself when plugged in. Again I am not sure if this would be on the drive itself or on another piece of hardware inside of the enclosure. Be careful if you decide to "tear into" it to see what its made of...you may end up with 2 drives flubbed up!

Goodluck!

[bigH2O]

If you're really serious about getting rid of existing files on the hdd, there are a few utilities out there that will perform a DOD level wipe on the drive. My favorite is eraser. It is freeware, and available at http://www.tolvanen.com/eraser/. If you want to know how it works, read the whitepaper at http://www.usenix.org/publications/library/proceedings/sec96/full_papers/gutmann/. It's probably way over most people's heads, heck, some parts of it are over my head, but it will give you a general understanding of why deleting files and formatting hard drives does absolutely no good when dealing with a malicious file.