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Very Old Laptop

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by luv2bike2

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the laptop is a Core Pacific NB-386SX (i never heard of it). the CMOS battery died, the user replaced the battery and now when they boot up, they are getting a hard disk controller diagnostic error message. we retrieved the specs for the hard drive which is a Conner - CP2088, we entered the information in to the BIOS and rebooted (cmos settings are as follows: Size 85mb, cyl 548, hds 8, sect 38, wpcomp 0 lzone 548 and it is an IDE drive.)
i have been trying other settings and now i am getting "unable to initialize hard drive (drive type)".
i have no diskettes for this laptop, i think this laptop is about 15 years old.
i have looked on line for Core Pacific-i get nothing, the model number of the laptop and i get battery replaces websites. the user needs to get the information off of this hard drive. the user uses the laptop for testing parts in a manufacturing setting, i believe the OS is DOS. i have tried to boot up with a floppy disk and it won't boot up with that as well.
All suggestions or comments are welcome!
Thanks,

14 replies

by cookieorc

Have you tried putting the drive in another computer?

What happened when you replaced the CMOS Battery?

by luv2bike2

I have taken the hard driver out and reseated it and still nothing. i do not have another laptop to put that hard drive in. We do not get the CMOS battery error message any more. i went into the BIOS and made all the changes to it and the only problem it has is the hard drive, it can not locate it. when the laptop boots up it runs a diagnostics report and when it gets to the hard drive it fails... everything else passes.

by robo_dev

or do you hear a ka-chunk or a clack clack sound?

Old hard drives sometimes get stuck, and a gentle rap can get them spinning again.

On old drives like that you can actually replace the controller board on the back of the drive, and that may work.

Of course good luck finding a connor Cp2088 anywhere to use for parts.

by nepenthe0

Remove the hard drive, and plug it into the Coolmax adapter:

http://tinyurl.com/6bm6zd

Plug the Coolmax adapter's USB cable into a functioning computer. The old laptop hard drive will be assigned a drive letter, and will appear in [i]Explorer[/i] mode.

Transfer the files off the old laptop hard drive just as you would from any other drive.

Rick/Portland, OR

by luv2bike2

if it does not cost to much for the item.
Thanks for your suggestion!
:)

by oh smeg

So I would suggest using the Adapter above or a USB Caddy for 2.5 inch drives. It is possible that the M'Board in the NB has died and that the Data is intact on the HDD. But with things this age anything is possible, only thing on your side here is that when new this was all expensive Cutting Edge stuff so it's better than the Run of the mill System Makers products.

The only thing to watch out for when using a USB Adapter with a old IDE Drive is the way that the jumper is set on the drive. It may not need a jumper at all or the drive may need to be set to Master so try it in both configurations before pronouncing the Drive Dead.

The listed adapter above should cost somewhere around the $25.00 mark and you can get a 2.5 inch USB Caddy ranging from a fairly similar price up to about $45.00 depending on where you look.

If you do a lot of Drive Testing the Coolmax adapter is a better idea as it accepts most drive types where as a USB Caddy only accepts the one drive type. But the USB Caddies do offer better protection to the drives so whatever you use be careful very careful. And don't leave the drive running when it is not required as they overheat very quickly.

OH BTW you can load a new NB with DOS just use DR DOS not M$ DOS as it's better and works on a bigger range of hardware. But you will have to dig around for the DOS Drivers and make some alterations as DOS can not recognize and use the Bigger HDD of today in full so you will need to limit the size of the drive.

Col

by luv2bike2

and if i tap it nothing happens.
i think the user is going to have to figure something else out.

Thanks all for your suggestions.
:)

by luv2bike2

the hard drive is dead. :(

i appreciate everyones input on how i can get this very antiquated laptop working once again. it is a goner.

Thanks everyone!!

by luv2bike2

thanks for your input!
i will post back to let you know what happens

Thanks,

by luv2bike2

did not work.
i think the hard drive is a goner.
thanks for all inputs!!

by rob miners

the other trick with the handle end of a medium sized screwdriver give it a light tap on the opposite end to the connectors.

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