Problems adding hard drive as a 'slave'

mccoffee · Post by **mccoffee** » Sat Jul 03, 2004 10:33 pm

mark it wasn't even showing in the bios

Mark · Post by **Mark** » Sat Jul 03, 2004 10:42 pm

mccoffee wrote:mark it wasn't even showing in the bios

oh i missed that

mccoffee · Post by **mccoffee** » Sat Jul 03, 2004 10:43 pm

next time read the whole post j/k

Mark · Post by **Mark** » Sat Jul 03, 2004 10:45 pm

mccoffee wrote: next time read the whole post j/k

roger that

mccoffee · Post by **mccoffee** » Sat Jul 03, 2004 10:45 pm

Mark his case was a strange one

Mark · Post by **Mark** » Sat Jul 03, 2004 10:47 pm

mccoffee wrote:Mark his case was a strange one

i am seeing that now.

vizman · Post by **vizman** » Mon Jul 05, 2004 8:14 pm

Follow up: Bought me a Western Digital 120 GIG drive--- same problem: will not identify. I'm not going through the whole 'try all jumper possible combination' hurdles with this one. contact DELL and they won't support any problems dealing with harddrive's not bought through them... regardless of the fact that these are the SAME hard drives THEY use! typical. I'm thinking it is something with the computer itself - rather than the harddrive.. because I follow all the harddrive instructions to a tee with no results. The computer will NOT recognize the new harddrive (and I use the cable provided.. which is cable select, like the original one that comes w/Dell).

perhaps I should put the harddrive as master and boot up the computer via floppy. At least determine if the hard drive can be identified.

Drag'n this thing out.. but I'd REALLY like to have additional memory to do video archiving.

thanks for hang'n in there.

vizman

The Dude · Post by **The Dude** » Mon Jul 05, 2004 9:12 pm

Wow that sucks! I am sure you must have done this but maybe check it again. In your bios probably the first page, where it lists primary master primary slave, if it says "none" that may be because it was set to none by Dell. If it shows none with the drive connected go to that entry and hit enter or set it to auto. The PC should try to autodetect it, if that doesn't work check this. On another page of the bios, maybe called integrated peripherals, look for primary master primary slave etc. This is for UDMA and pio mode. set them all to auto. I'm reaching a bit on this last one.

If that doesn't work, back the truck up, back it right over the case.

vizman · Post by **vizman** » Mon Jul 05, 2004 9:27 pm

The Dude wrote:Wow that sucks! I am sure you must have done this but maybe check it again. In your bios probably the first page, where it lists primary master primary slave, if it says "none" that may be because it was set to none by Dell. If it shows none with the drive connected go to that entry and hit enter or set it to auto. The PC should try to autodetect it, if that doesn't work check this. On another page of the bios, maybe called integrated peripherals, look for primary master primary slave etc. This is for UDMA and pio mode. set them all to auto. I'm reaching a bit on this last one. If that doesn't work, back the truck up, back it right over the case.

beep-beep-beep. (crunch).
Okay - not there yet. Besides, my current hard drive works just fine. My BIOS appears to have ONLY 1 page... not the range of options I'd like. I don't see any 'pages' to choose from, except for the 1st screen. Rather rudimentary. I'll check it out one last time. thanks
vizman

mccoffee · Post by **mccoffee** » Mon Jul 05, 2004 9:40 pm

try to update the bios to current version the a8 i belive

vizman · Post by **vizman** » Tue Jul 06, 2004 7:14 pm

I upgraded to A08 - no positive results.

hardnut · Post by **hardnut** » Wed Jul 07, 2004 1:01 am

OK, I think I've managed to follow this thread so far...

was the drive detected on it's own in the BIOS as a master, and if so, could you then try connecting the original hard drive as a slave?

I know some drives in the past used to refuse point blank to work as a slave to any other drive, but this shouldn't be the case now.

If it works like this you could always use a utility such as ghost to copy everything from the old drive to the new one (which will probably be a faster drive anyway), short of that, maybe someone lives near you that could help?

vizman · Post by **vizman** » Sat Jul 10, 2004 7:11 pm

ha HA!
got it to work!

something to add to the 'collective'... check the darn pins!
The bottom left pin of the IDE connection for my CURRENT harddrive was bent - not affecting its use, because it worked. HOWEVER - unbent pin - connected current drive - connected NEW drive (slave) - plugged in - WORKS.

whodathought?!

glad to put this to rest. Thanks one and all for putting up with this enigma.

and with my blunder

vizman

YARDofSTUF · Post by **YARDofSTUF** » Sat Jul 10, 2004 7:24 pm

The SAGA ENDS!

hardnut · Post by **hardnut** » Sat Jul 10, 2004 8:17 pm

vizman wrote:ha HA!
got it to work!

something to add to the 'collective'... check the darn pins!
The bottom left pin of the IDE connection for my CURRENT harddrive was bent - not affecting its use, because it worked. HOWEVER - unbent pin - connected current drive - connected NEW drive (slave) - plugged in - WORKS.

whodathought?!

glad to put this to rest. Thanks one and all for putting up with this enigma.

and with my blunder

vizman

LOL, something you wouldn't easily spot unless you were pulling the drive out, only ever heard of something like that causing a problem once, but it was in a scsi drive array...

*makes mental note*

Glad you got it sorted though