HDD LED on HP Elitebook 2540p is constantly solid

[muthabored]

Hello, Forum:

From the time the OS (Windows XP Pro, SP3) attempts to load on the device, the hard drive LED is solid until the laptop is shutdown (the LED stays solid during a logoff and in Standby). Since this issue began, I repeatedly check the Task Manager for processess that might be overtaxing the CPU/memory but that looks normal. The device isn't overheating or shutting down/rebooting on its own but it is very slow.

I've also done the following:

HP Internal Hard Drive Diagnostics (the LED behaves normally in Setup)
Hard Drive Defrag
BIOS Update
Systemboard/Processor Replacement
Complete Drive Wipe/OS Re-Install (HDD Replacement included)
Confirmed that all of the device drivers are up to date

If anyone has any other suggestions, I'm more than eager to hear them!

Thanks in advance!

 

[goombawaho]

WOW - If you swapped the motherboard and processor to fix this problem, you just threw out a lot of money my brother.

If you boot to something like the hard drive manufacturer's diagnostic utility (a pseudo-comprehensive list here), see if the drive is quiet BEFORE you begin the test and then it should be mostly active during the test (flashing light, mostly solid).

http://www.tacktech.com/display.cfm?ttid=287

If it behaves normally and passes the long test, then you have to figure the hard drive is just being occupied by some process OR the system is woefully lacking in memory, resulting in lots of swap file activity. Answer following questions.
1. How much memory does the PC have?
2. Confirm that Page File is ENABLED and you see a PAGEFILE.SYS in the root of C

http://www.howtogeek.com/79892/xp-tweak-disable-page-file/)

3. If you boot it into Safe Mode, does it settle down after the desktop appears?

 

[Sympology]

I'd suggest the following (from memory as been a while since I've done XP work)

Try a different AV if you have one installed and only use one!
Turn the indexing service off
Remove desktop search if installed.

Robert Wilensky:
We've all heard that a million monkeys banging on a million typewriters will eventually reproduce the entire works of Shakespeare. Now, thanks to the Internet, we know this is not true.

http://alvechurchlounge.org.uk

 

[goombawaho]

Try a different AV if you have one installed and only use one!
Turn the indexing service off
Remove desktop search if installed.

^^All good ideas to do AFTER proving that the hard drive CAN behave normally and is healthy.