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Duron 1200 won't recognise hard drive

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15 replies

by shantie

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I just got a new duron 1200 and set up my old hard drive which is an 8 gig, but will not auto detect it. I have checked and rechecked cables to make sure correct, also will not recognise cdrom, which is on slave. By the manuals instructions I have to connect the blue connector to the m/board, the gray one, which is second in line to the slave and the black to the hard drive which is last in line. I have done and rechecked this. Do I have to change anything in the Bios because this is an old hard drive and only 8 gig, or is it just that the newer motherboard will not accept small hard drives as masters. thanks for help. Another thing I thought of is the hard drive does have win98 fdisked with 100% dos partition with FAT 32, does that have anything to do with it. Thanks again.

15 replies

by still_learning

Make sure that the Hard disk drive is jumpered to Master and the CDRom is jumpered to Slave. Also make sure that you have the current BIOS and IDE controller for the system board. Hope this helps.

by shantie

sorry all that you mentioned was already checked. I had to use user instead of auto for some reason and set all the parameters myself. This worked but still do not know why would not auto detect. Sorry it hast taken so long to answer but been shifting house.

by gigelul

Hi,
I missunderstand something in your description:
"By the manuals instructions I have to connect the blue connector to the m/board, the gray one, which is second in line to the slave and the black to the hard drive which is last in line."
On motherboard you have two IDE conectors (primary and secondary). You must use a flat cable which will connect Primary IDE with your HDD and a second flat cable which will connect Secondary IDE with your CD-ROM or a single flat cable with 3 connectors which will connect Primary IDE with both HDD and CD-ROM.
In any situations you must check jumper settings on both HDD and CD-ROM (usualy HDD-master and CD-ROM-slave when work on the same IDE connector).

by shantie

Sorry same as above all these were checked, I got out of it by using USER instead of auto, this worked but still can not figure why it would not auto detect. but thanks for answer. Sorry it has taken so long to answer but been shifting house.

by tg2

what brand and model is this new motherboard?

most of them do not have problems seeing older drives.. however.. if this is like some of the early ATA100 motherboards... like Asus's A7v ..

the A7v had 4 ide connectors.. two were specifically for ATA 100 and where controlled independent of the regular motherboard bios.. it had an additional Promise bios that had no options..

if this is NOT a *NEW* board, but your old board and you're putting a newer CPU on it.. try going back to the oldone first..

if the old CPU works and you get your drives.. then you probably need to update your motherboard bios because of some speed or timing glitch.

post more info about the board if this doesn't help..

-T

by shantie

Hi, no this was a brand new board. sorry it has taken so long to answer but been moving house. Thanks again

by mic2dal

The first thing that i would do is connect the gray connector to the hard drive which is the master and then connect the black connector to the cdrom. Also check the jumper cables on the back of the hard drive. If the cd rom is jumpered as the master nothing will work right. hard drive jumpered master and cd rom as slave will correct it. Although I would suggest that if you have another ide cable and an open secondary connection, to cable the hard drive by itself on primary connection and have the cd rom on the secondary connection by itself as a master. This will make things run a little smoother.

by shantie

Hi, sorry but all that was done I got out of it by using USER instead of auto detect, do not know why but all is well. Thanks for the answer, sorry it has taken so long to reply but been moving house.

by alpha-male

I would start this way:

1) make sure you are connected to the Primary IDE controller.

2) Disconnect the CD-Rom entirely.

3) Make sure the HD is jumpered as "Master"

4) Reboot, go under the BIOS and attempt to detect the HD.

5) If itsdetected, save and exit. Power down and connect the CD-Rom to your Secondary IDE connector (not on the same cable as the HD).

6) Reboot and see if you can detect both devices.

If after step 4, you still cannot detect the HD, then I would try a new cable.

Hope this helps!

by shantie

Hi thanks for the answer but all this was tried, I had to use USER instead of Auto detect and worked, do not know why but did. Thanks again, sorry for taking so long to reply but been moving house. Thanks

by thechas

It sounds like you have a drive conflict.
I have noticed that an old IDE drive concept is returning.

Check if the cable is a "cable-select" style cable.

If so, there should be a hole in the cable between the master and slave drive connectors.

If so, or if the motherboard manual says to, set the drive jumpers to cable select.

Did you have both drives on the same cable on your old system?

Unless you have another device using the secondary IDE port, I would install the CD-ROM driveon the secondary IDE, and leave the hard drive by itself on the primary channel.

Chas

by shantie

No, all that was done and checked, although you might have something with the old drive, but used USER instead of auto detect and all is fine, do not undetstand why but using it now. sorry for late reply but been moving house. Thanks again.

by ladybird.evr

Hallo,

Maybe it is because of poor power. If you have a 235Watt power supply you will probably also experience this problem. If this is the case replace it with at least 250Watt or above.Try to disconnect your CD-Rom(s) and connect your harddriveinstead. When your drive is recogniced correctly then for sure weak power is causing troubles.

Greeting, Eric from Holland

by shantie

No brand new power supply and board, as I said above do not know why but worked when I used USER instead of auto detect, working fine now, thanks for the answer, sorry for late reply but been shifting house. regards

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