Windows 10: Did my cheap OEM key break my hard drive?

Hey guys, I'm new here and a little desperate so if there's a better place to ask this please let me know.

I bought a Eurocom (Canadian custom laptop) Monster 4 two years ago with an SSD and HDD. Bought a $13 OEM key to save some cash and I didn't have any issues until last spring where it would occasionally crash, sometimes on boot it would say "restart and insert proper boot device" or whatever. BIOS shows that my SSD with Windows isn't there. This problem was intermittent.

Two weeks ago it wouldn't even boot up windows and would take me straight to the troubleshooting screen. Entering BIOS reliably showed that the SSD was there so the issue would have been with windows.

I just got it back from CDC Computers after they wiped the drive and reinstalled Windows. Two days after reinstalling all my software, the problems in the first paragraph are happening again. I'm in design school and not having my computer is making things hard but the stress is honestly worse.

If i have to buy a full copy of Windows, so be it, but I want to know if its common or even possible for an OEM key to fuck up your computer's memory? To the point where Windows breaks and BIOS can't even see a drive?

submitted by /u/thrisp
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:)

 

Overclock your hard drive!!!

Heres a much easier hack that I realized quite a few years ago that really does work!

REQUIREMENTS:

• Hard drive with molex power connection.
• PSU with more than 1 strand that has molex plugs on it.
• Wire strippers, soldering iron if you're fancy, electrical tape if you're not.

STEPS:

• Take the strand of connectors from your PSU, and decide which one will be the donator for this overclocking adventure.
• Cut the yellow and orange cables, then twist them together.
• Find the power connector you've chosen as the overclocking connector, and release the orange cable from the connector. Now use your preferred method to bind them together, then place it back together.
• Plug in a drive and feel the speed!

Congratulations! You've just overclocked your hard drive!

 

Western Digital No Longer Honoring Warranties on OEM or Bare Drives.

Difference between WD OEM vs. Retail (RTL) drives
Answer ID 1352 | Last Updated 04/28/2015
Online Store sells both Retail and OEM packaged hard drives.

There are no physical or developmental differences between our Retail and OEM hard drives

Retail hard drives (Example: WD1200JBRTL) are sold in a retail package and may include the accessories below:

• Quick Installation Guide
  
• Acronis Installation Software (must be downloaded)

OEM or Original Equipment Manufacturer hard drives (Example: WD1200JB) are sold to OEM Computer manufacturers or Distributors in bulk packaging (bare drive only).

• OEM drives are sold without accessories or installation software.
  
• OEM drives may not contain a warranty from Western Digital. When Western Digital sells hard drives to OEM computer manufacturers such as Dell, Compaq, Apple, etc, we sell these drives without warranty. The OEM computer manufacturer would include the hard drive under the warranty of the computer system that the hard drive was installed into. For more information about hard drive warranties, please see our Warranty Policy.

If this is the case then OEM HDD's must be sold only to OEM's anything else must be sold as a retail HDD retail stores should be prohibited from purchasing in bulk those HDD's destined for OEM's and only be allowed to purchase and sell retail HDD's any supplier caught selling OEM HDD's to retail stores should be made to honor any warranty which WD themselves would be legally bound to honor on a same type retail HDD

 

Hard drive/ OS issue

a guy suggested :

• shutdown
• unhooked HDD
• restarted
• yay !!
• reconnected HDD
• restarted
• yay !!

also , try method 3
How do I unlock the drive where Windows 10 is installed?