Corrupt drives? Help! [Now more of a "Invisible Partition on corrupt HDD?" issue]

[Imfalling]

So a few days ago, I left my home for 4 days. I returned home yesterday, and booted up my computer. It felt a little less responsive than usual, but everything was working.

I was browsing around on my hard drive, when suddenly, it just froze when I tried to open a folder. I simply restarted the computer, but this time, the HDD didn't show. The computer froze shortly after, and I shut it down.

When I restarted again, the computer wouldn't move past the windows logo, and when I left it there for a while, the screen just went blank. I read around on some forums that my HDD apparently is corrupt. So I took out the HDD, leaving the disk reader and my default boot disk (SSD) in the case. Upon starting, a text prompt showed, saying that no boot disk could be found, despite the HDD not containing the windows files, and that is supposedly the corrupt one.

Using the windows installation disk, I can get to the "repair" screen, but no drives show.

What happens now, is that without the HDD, the computer says there's no boot drive, and with the HDD, it stops at the windows logo.

I'm stuck. Anyone have any ideas?

Specs:
SSD - Kingston 120gb
HDD - WD Blue 1TB
CPU - Amd Athlon 760k
GPU - GTX 780ti
PSU - Corsair CX600
Mobo - Some Asus board.

I'm going to be rebuilding my computer soon, with some new parts. I suppose if both my drives are corrupt, I'll just buy two new ones. I'd rather not though.

Thanks

 

[vesp3r]

are you 100% sure your windows is on the SSD and not on the HDD?
It is quite possible that your boot drive is the HDD and the SSD is faulty
See if it will boot up if you have only HDD plugged in.
Also try on different slot and with different cables

 

[Imfalling]

are you 100% sure your windows is on the SSD and not on the HDD?
It is quite possible that your boot drive is the HDD and the SSD is faulty
See if it will boot up if you have only HDD plugged in.
Also try on different slot and with different cables

I am 100% certain that windows is on the SSD. There is absolutely no way the HDD is the default boot disk. I've tried booting from the HDD, but that doesn't do anything, it just shows an empty prompt.

 

[vesp3r]

then the possibility that your SSD is the culprit here
You will have to check it the way i mentioned above and if possible even connect it to usb if you have ext. drive case or try connect it to another pc and see how it will react.

 

[Imfalling]

I've swapped the sata porta around a bit, and my pc starts. It takes about 30 minutes - 1 hour to even get to the desktop, and even so, I can only start programs on my ssd. My HDD does no longer show in the "Computer" tab, and I've concluded that it's most likely the hdd which is corrupt. However, like I said, trying to boot the pc without it doesn't work.

How do I fix the HDD?

 

[Imfalling]

UPDATE:

So actually took out all the components of the computer, plugged them all back in, and I got to the desktop after about 30 minutes of waiting. There are barely any programs, since the HDD is corrupt, and the computer is very limited in function.
Heading to the "Computer" tab, you can see two drives, the SSD, which, mind you, is most likely working as intended (I could perform a diskcheck on it, and no errors were found), and a very peculiar drive. In the place where my HDD generally is, is a disk which cannot be accessed, it doesn't display storage space, it's not the name I'd assigned to my HDD, but it's taking up the drive letter I was using for my HDD.

I cannot right click it and select properties. When I to that, either explorer crashes, or nothing at all happens. I cannot open any shortcuts to the drive, as explorer simply crashes.

I can read data from the SSD, but writing to it crashes any programs doing so.

Again, taking out the HDD isn't a possibility, because for some peculiar reason, the PC won't boot without it, despite the SSD being the Windows disk.

This is a screenshot of the "Computer" tab:

http://i.imgur.com/USPvo0w.jpg

Sorry for potato quality, I can't take a screenshot, since it just crashes my explorer.

That's all the information I can give at this time.

 

[vesp3r]

hmmm good job on reassembling the pc... but having problems on both drives... its possible to be Mobo or even PSU.
Can you screenshot the info from computer disk manager? And possibly see if it will show the filesystem of the drives. Try running the pc with only the necessary components - MB, ram, PSU, CPU, SSD, GPU (unless you have integrated)
There is no reason (as far as i know) Your boot drive to require another drive to run windows... unless they were merged by some software and most win components are on the HDD

Ill also look into similar issues as its getting a bit strange for me maybe some storage expert should also give his opinion

UPDATE: btw win 8.1 tend to create system partition on both drives if both were present during OS install. In other words you might also have to reinstall windows with only the SSD inside and see if it will crash you again but dont just jump on doing it rightaway

 

[Imfalling]

hmmm good job on reassembling the pc... but having problems on both drives... its possible to be Mobo or even PSU.
Can you screenshot the info from computer disk manager? And possibly see if it will show the filesystem of the drives. Try running the pc with only the necessary components - MB, ram, PSU, CPU, SSD, GPU (unless you have integrated)
There is no reason (as far as i know) Your boot drive to require another drive to run windows... unless they were merged by some software and most win components are on the HDD

Ill also look into similar issues as its getting a bit strange for me maybe some storage expert should also give his opinion

UPDATE: btw win 8.1 tend to create system partition on both drives if both were present during OS install. In other words you might also have to reinstall windows with only the SSD inside and see if it will crash you again but dont just jump on doing it rightaway

Thanks for your shown concern! As for screenshotting the disk manager, it may prove a little difficult. Trying to open the disk manager simply crashes explorer, or nothing happens at all.

Did you see my screenshot of the "Computer" tab? It seems to detect the drive, but whenever I try to access data from it, explorer crashes.

Now, I did as you said and took out all the drives (well, unplugged the sata connectors) and after the asus boot screen, this popped up:
i.imgur.com/xMgQuxi.png

I'll try to fiddle around a little bit for while.

Also, I have Windows 7 Home Premium.

[Update]
I've found that the Computer doesn't boot with just the HDD either.

Boot with only SSD = No boot disk...
Boot with only HDD = Error code: 0xc000000e
Boot without either = i.imgur.com/xMgQuxi.png
Boot with both = Extremely slow and barely functional Windows boot after 30 minutes.

What the heck is going on...

 

[Imfalling]

[Update again]

So I've now, through the windows installation disk, discovered that there is in fact a partition of windows on the HDD. However, this partition is 0mb, and has an unknown location.

Very interesting, but aggravating.


[UPDATE AGAIN]

I left the computer for a while, and when I returned, a prompt saying "The request could not be performed because of an I/O device error" was up.
It seems as if the HDD is in fact broken, but now the issue is more of getting rid of it. I can't boot the computer without it for some reason. What do I do? There's a partition of 0mb on the HDD, that for some reason, Windows desperately needs.