Hard Drive Failing

[HEARTLESS]

My question is if my hard drive is failing could it pervent me from installing another os properly?I am currently using Windows 98 SE trying to put in Windows XP Home.

[kenc51]

Yes!

[dicecca112]

why do you think its failing?

[DMB2000uk]

why do you think its failing?

I'm guessing because her winXP installation isn't working.

@HEARTLESS: It could be due to memory errors, or a scratched CD, but with a system as old as what it sounds like, it could well be the drive.

Dan

[HEARTLESS]

The reason I say this is when I shut off my computer and start it up the next morning,it acts like it was not shut off properly,and does a scan disc. Not to mention sometimes it shuts off on its own.There are other things its doing that leads me to think that the drive is getting ready to go too hard drive heaven Thank-You Been a great help.
By the way All FEMALE here

[DMB2000uk]

By the way All FEMALE here

woops

^_^

Dan

[stev]

If the machine is old enough for the HDD to go bad, how about finding a slightly newer HDD to do the install on. I've come across many tossed out machines lately in the sub 1.2Ghz era that have provided disk space from 1.7Gb to 15Gb in size for FREE.

The only reason why I mention these other smaller HDD vs today's mega sized Gb drives is that the older machines have BIOS's that max out around 20Gb plus or minus a few Gb.

Really old machines running older HDD technologies like MFM or RLL encoding may not like WinXP at all and thus give you FALSE errors that the drive is bad. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_disk