Critical Process died and disk repair loop

Hi all,

I've been having problems recently with my laptop (Samsung 7 series) freezing. I then get a pop up saying "windows has stopped working", and it either unfreeze after a few minutes or I need to force close it.

This happened again yesterday, and wouldn't unfreeze so I force turned it off. Upon restarting, I got a BSOD with the message "critical_process_died", and the laptop restarted itself, only to BSOD again. Now when I turn it on it goes straight into disk repair for C:, saying it is scanning for and repairing errors. However, even after running overnight it never progressed beyond 9% on this, and now I cannot exit the loop without force closing the laptop - but when I reboot it goes straight back into disk checking.

Obviously I have no clue what has caused this. A recent AVG scan was clean, and I cannot recall an update that happened yesterday. Unfortunately. Unfortunately I cannot load up the laptop to even check anything. Hopefully this is a software issue and I can get it fixed at a tech store, but I'm worried it could be a hardware problem (Internet suggested there was some memory corruption?). Any help would be very much appreciated, I'm a bit panicked about it as I rely on my laptop for all my work!

Thanks in advance...

axe0 said:

Diagnostics Test

 HDD TEST

Run SeaTools DOS to check the integrity of your HDD. SeaTools for DOS and Windows - How to Use - Windows 7 Help Forums

   Note

Do not run SeaTools on an SSD as the results will be invalid.

I can't run anything on the laptop as it never boots up beyond the disk error stage, so there's no scope for me to install or run any programs.

axe0 said:

Please note that you don't have to boot your system to Windows for the DOS version.
If you can use any system for a few minutes, you can setup a bootable USB or CD with SeaTools DOS and boot from it on your laptop.

I'll give that a try tonight then, but I don't hold out much hope!

Took it to tech support at PC World today for a quick eyeball diagnostic, and the guy said it sounds like hard drive failure and quoted about £120 for a repair and replacement, plus £80 on top to retrieve the lost data from my old disk. I wonder if that is the only problem whether it is a fix I can do myself, though I was warned that I'd probably have to pay for a new copy of windows 10 because apparently the product code for my current copy is linked to the hard drive (I upgraded from Win 8), and unless I could retrieve that code I'd have to buy it anew. Does that sound like a rip off?!

axe0 said:

The replacement and recovering the data you can do yourself, you might need to have a docking station for recovering data like picture below.
The users from the Windows 10 Help Forums can help you with recovering your data :)
I don't know about warranty, but you need to check it if there is any before replacing the hard drive.

I believe the activation is in your BIOS implemented by your manufacturer which will be used as soon as an installation is booted for the first time.
This means that you need to replace the motherboard before you need a new license.

Docking station:
Attachment 60041

Thanks for you help so far, very grateful to have someone talk me through things :)

I think what I'll probably just do is get it professionally fixed and the hard drive replaced, because I don't trust myself to be able to do that, and will then try with the help of the forum to retrieve my old data myself to save myself some money. Note to future self - become more computer savvy!