Question Weird series of computer problems, don't know which is the right forum

[pmv]

Weird series of computer problems.

First thing was, one hard drive started reporting SMART errors. Then it disappeared entirely. Then it came back (whereupon I backed up _some_ of what was on it, the stuff that wasn't easily replaced). Then it died entirely.
(I strongly suspect it was the extreme heat from the heatwave that was responsible - it was, maybe significantly, the oldest drive in the machine, being over ten years old and predating the rest of the computer).

Then the PC went really weird, repeatedly freezing on boot, and then started insisting on doing scandisk on each drive in turn after a reboots (not just the failing drive), then doing some sort of convoluted windows "Attempting repair" thing that I've never encountered before. Then it recovered, only minus the failed drive. Except one file - one recently edited before the crash - on one of the other, non-failed drives had mysteriously become zero-length, with all the content gone.

Then for a couple of days after the PC/windows clock kept randomly jumping back a few hours every now and then. It didn't seem to be running slow, it seemed fine whenever I watched it, but every time I stopped watching it and constantly comparing it to the wall clock, I'd look at it again and discover it had somehow gone backwards a couple of hours when I wasn't looking. I don't think it was running slow, so much as randomly jumping backwards every now and then (only I never caught it in the act). Checking "services" seemed to say that the windows time service wasn't running, so I restarted it.

Then SFC /scannow for once actually found some windows errors (on a third drive, the windows drive) and fixed them (never, ever seen SFC actually do anything before). And after a reboot it seems the clock has returned to working normally again.

Various malware scans failed to find anything.

Seems like everything is back to normal again, replaced the dead drive, seems as if I just lost a single text file on one other drive. But really baffled as to what that was all about, especially that file turning to zero length, when it wasn't on the drive that died.

Just wondering what the heck happened. What would cause the clock to randomly jump backwards? Could the failing drive have caused freezeups and reboots at a crucial point, causing corruption on the other drives, hence messing with Windows clock function?
(Have Windows 10, btw).

 

[In2Photos]

Could the failing drive have caused freezeups and reboots at a crucial point, causing corruption on the other drives, hence messing with Windows clock function?
(Have Windows 10, btw).

This would have been my guess. A failed drive could cause some random issues, especially if the failed drive was causing some voltage fluctuation.

 

[mxnerd]

Replace CMOS battery first.

What Is a Typical Symptom Of a CMOS Battery Failure?

The CMOS battery is as small as a button but it’s a significant part of your computer or laptop. The CMOS battery supplies power to the BIOS chip which starts the computer system after booting. It also manages data flow configuration between the OS and other attached hardware like hard drives...

www.electronicshub.org

If that doesn't work, probably PSU.

Also check Event Viewer - Administrative Events see if you can get some clues.

 

[pmv]

Replace CMOS battery first.

What Is a Typical Symptom Of a CMOS Battery Failure?

The CMOS battery is as small as a button but it’s a significant part of your computer or laptop. The CMOS battery supplies power to the BIOS chip which starts the computer system after booting. It also manages data flow configuration between the OS and other attached hardware like hard drives...

www.electronicshub.org

If that doesn't work, probably PSU.

Also check Event Viewer - Administrative Events see if you can get some clues.

Yeah, forgot to mention it, but I did replace the CMOS battery. It didn't _seem_ to make any difference (clock kept behaving weirdly).

But I would have expected the CMOS thing (which seems a fair guess, becuase that original battery would be over 10 years old) to cause a specific issue with the clock, i.e. it losing time when the computer was shut down. What actually was happening was the clock kept perfect time as long as I was watching it, but each time I stopped paying attention and either started web browsing, or left the computer unattended, the next time I looked at the clock it would be several hours slow. Seems as if it actually jumped backwards several hours when I wasn't watching it.

Was going to say it was now all fixed, but just noticed the clock has once again gone slow/backwards.

Hmmm, the only clue in the event log is that the timestamps of events do seem to confirm that the time is periodically going backwards. It's as if it's periodically resetting back to the last time it had when it synced with the windows 'time service'.