Laptop Woes

I've had my Sony Vaio (PCG-GRT250P) for about two years now. I basically use it only for internet browsing, email, and VPNing into work when I am away from the office.

Just about a year ago, it was caught in a vicious reboot cycle. The computer would begin to come up, get to a certain point, and reboot. Any attempt to boot from the harddrive was fruitless. I succombed to handing it over to my crack IT guys and had it back in a couple days with a new drive.

I've been happily spinning along until about a week ago. I'll be working along and all of a sudden the drive starts to spin like crazy and I get a blue screen of death. I have to power the thing off and back on at which point it tells me "Operating System not found". First couple of times I got really worried, but after I learn the pattern, I know to turn it on, reboot, come up in "Safe Mode", shutdown, and startup. At first, it only did it once a day, but now I can run for...




... (OK, I'm back now, it just did it again) ... about 10 minutes before it craps out. Funny thing is, now I have to let it "rest" (or basically cool down) before I start it up again.

I consulted my crack IT guys and sure enough, they said it was the drive again. A new drive is on order and should be here in a couple days. I can...





....(there it goes again) ... live with it until then.