I keep getting PXE-E61 Media test failure error on laptop start up
I’m having a problem with my Toshiba Satelite P20.
I believe that my HDD has finally worn out. Over the past few months, it used to take several attempts to boot up windows XP. Sometimes, the hard drive failed to load and sometimes the HDD light used to hang on, and I would receive a disk-read error has occurred. The message which I also used to get, and which I keep getting now is:
PXE-E61 Media test failure, check cable
Exiting PXE ROM
I tried booting up from a CD, and it failed to detect the hard drive.
I’m almost positive that you have a bad hard drive. PXE means Pre-Boot Execution Environment. You see this message when the laptop trying to boot from a remote server using the network card. If you didn’t see the PXE-E61 message before, it means that the network card was listed after the hard drive in the boot order (you can set the order in BIOS) and the laptop booted directly from the hard drive. Now, when the hard drive has failed, the laptop cannot detect it and tries to boot from the next available device – the network card. Your laptop is not configured to boot from a remote server using the network card, that’s why you are getting PXE-E61 Media test failure error. You have to replace the hard drive and reinstall the operating system.
January 23rd, 2007 at 6:28 pm
Karl,
Change the boot order in the BIOS, make sure the HDD is the first device on the list. If you still getting intermittent “PXE-E61 media test failure error” messages on startup, probably the hard drive is failing. Test the hard drive and if it fails, replace the drive.
January 23rd, 2007 at 6:25 pm
Richard,
Run memory test, you can use Memtest86+. Satellite A65 notebooks are known for their onboard memory failures. If the memory passes test, probably you have some kind of software issue.
January 21st, 2007 at 1:14 pm
I have a Toshiba Satellite A110. It’s less than 5 months old and in the past two days I’ve seen numerous PXE-E61 messages. A few times the message would just loop until I shut down the computer. Eventually, windows XP would kick in. The past few times, I still see the message once and windows loads. Am I experiencing the onset of a hard drive crash?
I havent changed the boot order in the BIOS yet.
Any help would be appreciated.
January 17th, 2007 at 6:27 pm
I have a toshiba satellite A65. I recently took apart and cleaned the fans and heat sink, because of a overheating problem. It solved the problem, I then upgraded the Bios from the toshiba web site. Everything ran great with no error messages. Then the one Error message came up and the Error message is (The instruction at 0x745f2780 reference memory at 0×00000000. The memory could not be read.) I try the debug and it still comes up but everything works fine.
Suggestions? Thanks Rich
January 13th, 2007 at 10:45 am
Jessica,
If you get the PXE-E61 error message on startup but after that the laptop boots to Windows, there is nothing wrong. You’ll have to enter the BIOS setup (Press Esc or F1 on startup) and modify the boot order. Set the hard drive (HDD) to be first bootable device, right now your laptop attempts boot from the network (LAN) first.
January 11th, 2007 at 2:19 pm
I am getting the PXE E61 error, too and my Satellite is less than 2 years old!! Does it really mean my hard drive is going to fail…HELP.
(
January 5th, 2007 at 12:35 pm
I am having the same problem as Alexander Wolstenholme, PXE-E61: Media test failure, check cable’, error; however, I am working with a new hard drive.
I am trying to install XP on a new hard drive by booting from the XP CD and have changed the boot sequence in the BIOS, but am still getting the PXE error.
One more note…I am not sure the hard drive was installed correctly because it does not show up in the BIOS. The BIOS is configured to “Auto” detect the hard drive; however it shows up as “None” instead of dispaying any hard drive properties. I do not have the hard drive self test within the BIOS.
I did not remove the old hard drive or install the new hard drive, so any help you could provide on checking that process would be appreciated as well.
Thanks!
January 4th, 2007 at 8:18 pm
Abdul,
It looks like the laptop worked for a while with the new drive. You even were able to install Windows on it. May be the new drive is defective? Test it and if it fails to pass the test, try replacing the drive. You can run Hitachi’s drive fitness test (link on the right side of the site), it’s free. Most sellers give you some warranty for their hardware.
January 4th, 2007 at 11:15 am
I’m having this ‘PXE-E61: Media test failure, check cable’ issue on my Dell PP02L so I tried to change the BIOS order n it didn’t work so I Bought a new HDD and i installed new Windows but after 5 min i got the same problem so now i spent $200 for nothing Please Help
January 2nd, 2007 at 6:43 am
I spent the better part of yesterday tring everything I could to fix that error on my gf’s toshiba. I’ve had BIOS errors before from a bad hard drive but this didn’t seem to be the case. I eventually got her’s working by dissabling the Norton GoBack system which apparently required the Norton System Works CD to be in the drive during start-up. My thoughts were that the Super drive on her computer wasn’t reading the cd and thus was dumping the start-up sequence. I had to disable Goback on my parent’s computer as well a few months earlier because it was incompatable with just about everything.
December 23rd, 2006 at 8:35 pm
Alexander,
Are you sure the noise is coming from the fan and not from the hard drive? When laptop hard drive goes bad, it might start making a loud noise kind of like a bad fan.
Here’s what I would try to do in order to backup the data. Buy an external USB enclosure for laptop hard drives, these enclosures are relatively cheap and you can find one in a local computer store for $15-20. Remove the hard drive from the laptop and install it into the enclosure. Connect the enclosure to another working computer via a USB cable (usually included with the enclosure) and pray. If you are lucky, the computer will detect the drive and you will be able to access it and backup your data. Let the hard drive cool down before you connect it to a working computer, keep it off overnight. You have better chances to access the hard drive when it’s not hot. If you can access the hard drive, back up the most important data first because the drive might fail completely any second.
December 23rd, 2006 at 5:55 am
Hi there,
I’m having this ‘PXE-E61: Media test failure, check cable’ issue on my HP Pavilion ze5400. I’ve tried changing the boot order in set to a number of variations (HDD 1st, 2nd and third positions) and am having no joy whatsoever. I can hear the drive spinning (just – the fan is incredibly noisy). When I boot up the following sequence occurs:
1. HP invent screen w. set up (F2) and LAN boot (F10) options.
2. Initializing MBA. press ctrl+alt B to configure.
3. Argon PXE boot agent v 2.01 (BIOS integrated) copyright details, with PXE copyright details below it. After a few seconds I then see this dreaded ‘PXE-E61: Media test failure, check cable’
Has anyone any ideas of my next step. I’m trying to just get the HDD to kick in so I can back it up, but I’m losing a bit of hope.
Regards,
A
December 18th, 2006 at 3:24 pm
My Laptop is working now. All i needed was a new HDD and i installed it and intalled new windows and it works. If any of you still having the same problem try changing the HDD (brand new HDD) and install new windows. Hope fully it should work.
December 17th, 2006 at 1:12 pm
Aarish,
If the hard drive will not appear in the BIOS, you might have a bad drive, faulty hard drive controller on the motherboard or corrupted BIOS. Your laptop is just three months old and I assume it’s still under warranty, send it back to the manufacturer for repair.
BTW, you can test memory yourself. Download Memtest 86+ utility, burn it on a CD and boot the laptop from this CD. The test will start automatically.
December 17th, 2006 at 8:02 am
My laptop is only three months odl, it’s a MDG VisionBookPro which worked fine but now it decided not to boot up. I get the message saying PXE-E61 Media test failure Check Cable. On the Bois it shows HDD none. I’v tried everything to fix it but nothing works. I thing there is something wrong with my RAM because after i boot the computer from the windows CD it says Check Memory.
December 14th, 2006 at 8:18 pm
Yo.
I was having the same problem.
I was trying to use a backup iso to install windows xp,
it was giving me this $^$#^@#%@^ error.
I’ve been so frustrated, i decided to try my real xp disc and it worked.
December 8th, 2006 at 6:24 pm
my toshiba laptop gives me the media test failure too. it used to occasionally say failure on harddrive replace failure imminent and right after it said hard drive their would a long row of hearts and little faces in squares before the word primary slave. that scared me, i don’t know what to do. i replaced the hard drive and still the same problem. occasionally it will boot before the blue screen pops up and says a lot of things about physical dumping of memory then i have to shut it off improperly and the errors keep coming up. WHAT CAN I DO!? I’M SCARED. i switched all the bois settings around and everything. and sometimes when it works in the bois under hard drive it will say the correct thing. but when its not working and the error messages come up it says either none or a bunch of hearts and faces. that can’t be good CAN SOMEONE PLEASE HELP ME?! i know its from a virus.
December 8th, 2006 at 12:40 am
Hi,
I have a Toshiba Satellite M105 notebook With BIOS password problem. From one day to another I turn on the computer and the laptop ask me for the password, and I didnt setup any.I live in Mexico and Toshiba dont support the computer here.
Do u have the procedure I have to follow in order to erase the BIO password.
Thanks in advance and I apreciatte your help.
December 1st, 2006 at 8:39 pm
Sandi,
When you start the test it will not detect “IDE Primary Master”? It will not see the hard drive at all? Probably it’s a bad drive. The problem description you submitted in the comment 9 sounds like a bad drive. Do you have an access to any other laptop? Can you find another laptop hard drive, install it into your laptop and see if it would be recognized by the test utility?
December 1st, 2006 at 2:35 am
All attempts failed with test..it keeps sticking at “Ide Primary Slave” I suppose this I cannot retrieve my data.
There was no reason that it should have died, it wasn’t dropped or shook?? Other than posibly overheating?? I noticed that this test is for Hitatchi and IBM could that make a dif?? I have a HP Pavilion dv1000..
November 30th, 2006 at 11:21 pm
Sandi,
Sounds like a bad hard drive. Test the drive with Hitachi’s DFT (link on the right side) utility and if it fails, replace the hard drive.
November 30th, 2006 at 10:21 pm
I was getting the same error message and disabled the LAN boot, and that got rid of that message.. So now I get the message “cannot find operating system. This laptop has been running great till now and I can hear the HD trying, it sounds like it is stuck in a loop.. and the error message keeps looping as well?? Any ideas??
November 28th, 2006 at 11:53 am
Jack Burns,
You can fix it if you change the boot order in the BIOS. Move the hard drive to the first position and you won’t see the PXE-E61 Media test failure message on start up anymore.
November 26th, 2006 at 8:30 pm
I’ve had this error woth my laptop as long as I can remember. It’s a Toshiba Satelite A45-S250. It doesn’t seem to cause any problems other than being a pain in the ass to see on boot up. It’s not the hard drive. I replaced it not because of this error but because I dropped it. Guess what? The new drive doesn’t make any difference. So, I think all those people out there telling you hard drive failure is sure to come are full of it. That’s my two cents worth.
Jack
November 11th, 2006 at 2:51 pm
i am having the same problem with a vaio pcg-fxa36 model, HD is reconized in BIOS, HD works in esternal enclosure, so i dont think it is the HD…the laptop has not been used in a while, i put it up because it did that…and i got it back out, charged the battery, reinstalled windows XP, works good, restart a couple of times, and now all i get is this…anyone know how to fix it?!?!???
October 18th, 2006 at 8:37 am
I was getting the same message PXE-E61 Media test failure. It has happened before ..My problem was that my
laptop battery was losing its charge..Once it charged good ,I was able to boot into Windows XP.. My laptop is a Sony Vaio. Try checking the Battery life.
September 18th, 2006 at 10:30 pm
It is a message due to some failure in the Network Adaptor or the Bios portion of it, I am also getting the same error for my toshiba, the error message comes prior the boot option detection.
If I connect the network cable in the network socket it is not giving me the error so try doing it in your case as well
-Kinnar
July 27th, 2006 at 12:29 pm
I am trying to ressurect my son’s dead Sony VAIO notebook. it is doing the exact same thing. We tried a new hard drive, but it made no difference. the BIOS is set to have LAN boot turned OFF, but it is also claiming there is no hard drive. With the BIOS set to AUTO, the HD lists as “NONE”. I can boot it from a floppy, or a CD. I think the reason it is resorting to the LAN boot is because there is no other boot source present ( without a floppy or CD inserted) and so it is trying the LAN boot as a last resort, despite it being turned off in the BIOS.
My thinking is that the Hard Drive Controller may have gone bad? It has sat a while since we tried the new hard drive, so today I disassembled it, attached a ground cable, and vacuumed it out (was some dust). Then I used Pro Gold on the HD connections to make sure they are good. I released and re-seated the memory modules, and also removed and reinstalled the CMOS battery after a few minutes, thinking that maybe the CMOS needed to be reset. I assume the HD controller is built in to the motherboard, so I don’t imagine there is any way to test that?
So far, nothing has made any difference. But since the BIOS is showing no HD, I am assuming that problem needs to be remedied first. I suggest the dozens of others I have read that have had this same PXE-E61 problem make sure their HD is even being detected before trying to go further.
Any suggestions are welcome!
July 25th, 2006 at 5:29 pm
I am having the same issue, I replaced the hdd with a new one and am still getting the same PXE message over and over, I checked my boot priority having HDD>CD>FDD>LAN, and still no dice!! Going nuts over here!! I also took my old HDD and slapped in into external case and works fine, so HDD is ruled out at this point I think
July 9th, 2006 at 3:52 am
Hey Thanks for your help. After about 45 minutes of attempts to boot the laptop, the Hard drive managed to kick in for a bit, so I backed up as many files as I could. it took about 20 minutes to load windows XP (I was superised to see it get that far), with the hard drive light constantly on. Eventualy The hard drive got stuck again, so i’m getting it replaced later on
Thanks for your help!!