Desktop

Ask something
Discussion Locked

Unable to detect harddrive

0 helpful
18 replies

by melvin

Closed to new repliesThis discussion is closed. It stays readable, but it takes no new replies.
The BIOS detect my harddrive but when I start it up using a start up disk, no hard drive has been detected, only the RAM drive, even when i try to run the fdisk, and error occured "Error reading fixed disk", Is there anyone who can help me fixing myharddrive?

18 replies

by rcom

Give more info on your system. Is this a new install, are you trying to reformat, what size drive, CPU speed etc.

The fact that you get the RAM drive which is setup on the C: drive, pretty much means the drive is working. There's probably disk management software installed on the drive. The disk manager software will allow you to create a boot disk that will work. Or there will be a message that tells you what to do if tryig to boot to a floppy. Example, "To boot to a floppy diskette press and hold the control key" If you boot to a floppy without doing this the drive will not come up. What happens if you don't use a floppy and boot the system?

You may have a bad boot sector.

by pinoy_teknik

What is the manufacturer of your hard drive? Did you already use their utility to setup the hard drive?

If that is Samsung go to:
http://www.samsungelectronics.com/hdd/support/utilities/utilities_01.html

If Seagate
http://www.seagate.com/support/disc/drivers/discwiz.html

If Maxtorr
http://www.maxtor.com/products/DiamondMax/software/maxblast/default.htm

If other just go to the manufacturer website and you can find it there at the support section.

Download the utility and use itsetup the hard drive.

If that does'nt work reply....

God Bless!!

__________
Pinoy_Teknik
http://kickme.to/flaire

by bohicam1

Make sure the bios is reading the drive correctly. Once you get to the 40GB+ size drives, alot of the older bios's just can't read them properly. If all else fails, try putting the drive into another computer and formatting a reasonable sized C:\ partition on it. The breaking point on an older bios is 7.8 GB
Good luck!

Mike

by wcp

Do a low level format on the HD. You can download the utility program from the manufacturer's website. Once successful, you can FDISK the HD and do a regular format.

by fenaikh

Hi
1- Try to set jumper settings to cs instaed of master.( unplug all other HD and CD)
2- Make sure that your hdd is on the first ide in in the last end of the ribbino cable connector and make sure the red side is PIN 1.
3- Dos your HD using Overlay.
How to Tell If Drive Overlay Program Is Installed in Windows
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;Q186057
Hard Disk Limited to 8-GB Partition
4- http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;Q153550
5- Do you boot to the hard disk with out any problems using the hard drive but not the a floppy as a boot drive?.
6-RAM drive will be in RAM (memory) and not hard disk. Secondlly what is your operting system?. I guess it is a win98/SE/ME operating system since you say that you have boot disk and ram drive after you boot.The boot disk which you are using may not reqninze the hard disk for many reasons such as wrong setting in BIOS then use auto detection. limitition of BOIS or IDE or OS (boot floppy). My other guss is the hard disk is using NTFS and that is Win/NT/2K/XP system.
7-Run fdisk and when you see "Enable the FAT32 system" answer yes. If you get the same message you may have a damage or NTFS partition.check info of your File system is it fat16/32 or NTFS. Download PARTINFO.ZIP the Display Partition Information
The Display Partition Information utility (free)
http://www.terabyteunlimited.com/utilities.html
It will expand to 3 files
PARTINFO.EXE - DOS/Win9x/WinME version.
PARTINFW.EXE - WinNT/Win2K/WinXP version.
readme.txt
This DOS or NT/2K/XP utility will display the partition information in the MBR and EMBR. The output can be redirected to a file and sent for review if needed.
You need a spciall boot disk to access FAT32 or NTFS file systems.

NTFS DOS

Making a Win98 bootdisk
http://www.putergeek.com/win98_boot/index.shtml

NTFSDOS
http://www.sysinternals.com/ntw2k/freeware/NTFSDOS.sht

by fenaikh

If all above did not work you could try last resource else you may have hardware problem.

***Warnning *********
The next step is the last resource. It will delete all prtion on your drive.If you have any data in your hard drive then "IT WILL BE LOST" when you run CLEAN1K.
**Warnning *********

If you received a CD or a boot floppy disk that came with your system you may run this utility from D:\HDDUTIL\CLEAN\CLEAN1K
(where D: is your drive letter).

Good luck

Mohamed

***Very Important NOTE *********
After you copy the URL a space or a %20 maybe gets inserted in the URL when you paste it into your browser. Delete any spaces or such characters from the URL for the page to be loaded.
***Very Important NOTE *********

by opatzg9

Did the drive used to work and crashed or is this brand new? Start by making sure the ribbon cable is connected at the board and hard disk, unplug and replug the 4 wire power to the drive. Boot again and see if hard drive is available. Make the drive the master and use alone on its ribbon cable. Put cd drive alone on other ide cable as master also. Try booting again and try fdisk.
Can you hear the drive spinning? It could be the drive has failed. Good luck

This discussion is closed to new replies.