[NA]Unable to See Harddrive2[NA]

[Let'sgoflying!]

I am starting this new thread, the old one got sidetracked:

When I start it up, I get a message saying "Dell; Press F2 to setup."

Then "Primary Hard Disk Drive not found and
Fixed optical drive not found.
No bootable devices F1 to reboot, F2 to enter setup."

Pressing F2, I get a set of 7 pages, including:

1 Setup page (Bios Version AO6, Pentium IV 1.7GHz, CPU speed same, Cach 512MB, SysMem 1.2MB, Video ..., Audio...., PRIMARY HARDDRIVE NOT INSTALLED, diskette drive A and B Not Installed, Modular bay CD-RW, Fixed optical Drive not installed.
{this computer does have a CD and a CDRW/DVD drive installed but no floppy drive}
2 Boot Order (lists Diskette Drive, Harddrive, CD/DVD etc in that order)
3 Boot Config (Post - minimal, LAN controller enabled, Docking status - undocked; ethernet, etc enabled.)
4 Basic Device Config Keyboard, Ports, Pointing device, etc)
5 Battery (right battery full, left not installed)
6 Power mgmt (timeouts, cpu mode, alarms, wakeup, brightness)
7 Security (passwords disabled)


Michael suggested there might be another connection on the motherboard, I don't see any other place for the HD to plug in and I have had it all apart.
M. asked if the CDROM works.... I haven't stuck a disk in there because I am fairly certain it will not be able to play a music CD or run a program from it if it so 'dead'... is this some other test that you refer to?

How do you get to the "bios setup to search for the hd manually", Michael? I did not see that option.

Faint, repeating (crescendo) zzzzzz of 2 seconds upon first powering up, Jesse - is that the noise you refer to?


How do I 'just hook up the CDROM drive', Jesse? (It's already plugged in.)
"Jumper to Master" oooo, that is over my head.

Bill I didn't even see a battery on the MB.

THANKS!

 

[Michael]

Ok Dave,
First. Take the cord out of the back of the HD and the motherboard. Plug it back in, Just making sure the connection is good. Reboot. If that doesnt work...goto setup and under 2 boot order, change your order to CDROM first then HD second. Place a windows cdrom into your cd drive and reboot....Windows should showup asking if you want to install...you cant because you dont have a HD, but this at least will tell us that your Motherboard is probably not the problem.....If you still have problems, do you have a second computer you can throw the HD into it to check? Or you might want to go to the local computer store, and buy a HD and throw it in there.

Sounds like your HD went bad. There should also be a maintenence field in your setup to restore default vaules...just a shot in the dark in case someone went in there and changed things around.

Good luck.

 

[rmciottijr]

Dave,

If you find out the drive is bad and you have files on it that you want you can try this. I am not sure if this is true but I had a new drive go bad on an office computer and Maxtor or Western Digital (not sure what drive it was) told me to put it in the freezer for about an hour. Then reinstall the drive and it might work. If this works I would not keep the drive I would backup all the files you want onto a new drive. Also I would have the computer running with the new drive before doing this I am not sure how long the old drive would keep working. Reading the link below the person said they could only boot up using DOS so I would read up on the DOS commands so you are ready

Before I posted this post and looked like an A$$ I looked it up and it could be true.

http://www.ozzu.com/ftopic32802.html

Hope this helps it didn't help me.

Bob

 

[Let'sgoflying!]

Ok Dave,
First. Take the cord out of the back of the HD and the motherboard. Plug it back in, Just making sure the connection is good. Reboot.

HD plugs into the mb directly, no cord.

If that doesnt work...goto setup and under 2 boot order, change your order to CDROM first then HD second. Place a windows cdrom into your cd drive and reboot....Windows should showup asking if you want to install...you cant because you dont have a HD, but this at least will tell us that your Motherboard is probably not the problem

On drive E(CD/RW) it spins up and loads a setup program then says it failed because it cannot find a hard drive.
If I put the disk into drive D (DVD) it spins but does not load anythingl
Does that rule out the MB?

.....If you still have problems, do you have a second computer you can throw the HD into it to check? Or you might want to go to the local computer store, and buy a HD and throw it in there.

Seems like a very specific model hd, I would need this exact computer.
What can a repair shop do to test this HD?

Sounds like your HD went bad. There should also be a maintenence field in your setup to restore default vaules

I don't see a setup to restore defaults.
HDs are listed at 150$ and a new computer on ebay at 600$ or so.
Thanks for your ideas!

Bob I might try the freezer trick as a diagnostic. I have full backups so that is not an issue. Thanks

 

[Greebo]

HD plugs into the mb directly, no cord.

We are talking about a PC here, right? Usually there's a power cord and an IDE cable that connect the drive to the mobo.

Anyway, based on this:

On drive E(CD/RW) it spins up and loads a setup program then says it failed because it cannot find a hard drive.
If I put the disk into drive D (DVD) it spins but does not load anythingl
Does that rule out the MB?

That's probably a dead drive.

Has the configuration for this computer changed recently? One thing to check, so long as this drive is alone on an IDE port, is that the jumpers for the drive are properly configured for the Master setting. I can't tell you exactly what that position is w/o knowing more about the drive, but most drives have the jumper settings printed on them somewhere. Look for: MA, CS and SL with a drawing of some dots. You want the jumper set so that MA is connected.

BTW just what kind of computer is this again?

 

[jesse]

Before I posted this post and looked like an A$$ I looked it up and it could be true.

http://www.ozzu.com/ftopic32802.html

Hope this helps it didn't help me.

Bob

I've tried it probably 20 times. It's never worked for me.
I think it was something that would work on older hard drives I've heard.


Like I said 9/10 chance your hard drive is bad. They fail a LOT more than motherboards do.

If this is a desktop you can pickup a hard drive for about $50 http://www.newegg.com

 

[wsuffa]

Dave,

Is this a laptop or desktop?

If a laptop, it sounds like either the connection between the hard drive and the motherboard is bad or the hard drive is bad. The actual drive controller is on the hard drive.

 

[tparsons]

Gotta be a Dell laptop. There's no separate drive detection setup in the BIOS, it either finds the drives, or not. You can change the order of boot device.

Try booting from a floppy, if you have the setup/recovery disk. You haven't given us the OS, so there may not be one. You'll have to set to boot first from floppy in the BIOS.

Next, you can try removing drives and reinstalling them. This may solve any contact problems.

I'm not an expert by any stretch, but I would recommend checking the hard drive in another computer by removing it from the computer, then the carrier. Electronics stores like Fry's have an interface adapter to connect laptop drives to desktop drive cables, if you're adventuresome. MAKE SURE YOU CONNECT THE ADAPTER THE CORRECT WAY THE FIRST TIME. Power applied to the wrong pins is frequently fatal. Ask me how I know. Make sure the master/slave jumpers are correct. According to Fujitsu, laptops use cable select for drive selection, but in desktops you usually have to do it manually. Looking at the pins from rear & top up, slave is the top/bottom pins jumpered on the far right side (right set of 4 pins with space to left). Set the laptop drive for slave, the boot drive as master, if it isn't already. Start the desktop and see if you can access the laptop drive. If so, the drive may be OK. GET ALL YOUR CRITICAL DATA OFF NOW!

If the hard drive is not recognized, that's your problem for sure. If it is recognized, you may have a MB failure.

What's you warranty at this point? If you have one, contact dell. If not, you may want to look for a MB on eBay, or a new computer.

Edit: Hummmm. I see that none of the drives are being recognized, including the CDROM. Bad sign as far as I know. You may not have a floppy, and the CD is the only way of booting without the HD. Beginning to look more like a MB failure.

 

[Let'sgoflying!]

its a dell notebook, inspiron 8200
the freezer trick did not help
newegg.com doesnt carry dell harddrives, and they are more than 50$!
Local tech took my info over the phone, says it is the hd and weve ordered one.
Thanks!