Another PC problem

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bitter1

Joined
Mar 3, 2008
Messages
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For those of you who remember my past few posts my PC hasn't been acting quit right in fact I have replaced just about everything and now it is working only I had to abandon my Seagate 300GB IDE hard drive because my new mother board only had one IDE slot and that is being taken up by my DVD drive so I bought a Hitachi Desk star 640GB SATA drive and I put it in the PC and hook it up and I turn the PC on and it doesn't post then I unplug it and them here I am typing this thread (the PC turns on with out the new hard drive). So off the top of your guys head is it a bad hard drive or what. I might just return it because I have an external Western Digital 640GB hard drive for large portable storage. Have you guys ever had this problem before if so tell me how you resolved this.

Thank you guys and thank you for putting up with my questions
 
what about the power supply? is it a good one? Did you check voltages when you turned it on? I wouldn't think a stuck SATA port would stop it from posting but it might.
Only way to know is swap it for annother one. The external might be the way to go. If that MB is new and the SATA port doesn't work, I would return it too, no telling what else is wrong with it
 
Do you get a beep code?
Does it post without the new hard drive plugged in?
What about with the old drive plugged into the IDE port?
- If yes to either, check bios settings, maybe update the bios

Do the power supply fan and motherboard fan spin when you power up?
Is this a new motherboard? Are you sure that you have the power switch on the right pins?
Unplug everything but the power supply, memory, and video card, then try with and without the SATA HD. If that doesn't work, try with the IDE HD.
 
That's not an uncommon problem with XP....though I'm not sure what OS you're using. Some versions (all?) of XP needs a driver to recognize a SATA drive, that driver is supposed to be installed when XP is. You can do a search for 'xp doesn't recognize sata' to find some possible ways to fix the problem.

BTW, you should be able to run the IDE HD and the DVD at the same time as each IDE channel supports two drives. You can do this by designating master/slave or possibly cable select.
 
Yes, XP does need a third party SATA driver. I just started on a Dell Inspiron 1525 with a FUBAR install of Vista on it. The client prefers XP and I have a Dell OEM XP Pro w/SP1a....so after setup copies all the setup files into memory and you get to the option to setup or repair and you choose setup, it can't detect any hard drives. SATA drives should be available for your mobo. I have, however installed XP Pro on an Acer desktop with SATA hdd....flawless...no additional SATA driver required. There are work-arounds to getting the SATA driver embedded into the XP install disc using a program called nLite. Any quesitons about all that and I'll be glad to send you the links on how to do that.

John
 
No the PC does not post with the new SATA drive in there but I am running a WD 74GB Raptor SATA drive in there with my windows XP pro SP2 on it and that is running fine and I just got it back a 2nd time from Fry's and they did a 2nd diagnostic on it for free because it is with in the 30 day period of my last diagnostic and it was found to be fine and my new power supply is a Corsair 650w so it is plenty powerful for my system so I think. I am thinking it is just a bad hard drive and returning it and using my external one.
 
jchaney said:
Yes, XP does need a third party SATA driver. I just started on a Dell Inspiron 1525 with a FUBAR install of Vista on it. The client prefers XP and I have a Dell OEM XP Pro w/SP1a....so after setup copies all the setup files into memory and you get to the option to setup or repair and you choose setup, it can't detect any hard drives. SATA drives should be available for your mobo. I have, however installed XP Pro on an Acer desktop with SATA hdd....flawless...no additional SATA driver required. There are work-arounds to getting the SATA driver embedded into the XP install disc using a program called nLite. Any quesitons about all that and I'll be glad to send you the links on how to do that.

John
Click to expand...

I have yet to own a dell i didn't have to wipe. I do a full debug and format. Dell is good for the money but always has probs with software install.
 
bitter1 said:
No the PC does not post with the new SATA drive in there but I am running a WD 74GB Raptor SATA drive in there with my windows XP pro SP2 on it and that is running fine and I just got it back a 2nd time from Fry's and they did a 2nd diagnostic on it for free because it is with in the 30 day period of my last diagnostic and it was found to be fine and my new power supply is a Corsair 650w so it is plenty powerful for my system so I think. I am thinking it is just a bad hard drive and returning it and using my external one.
Click to expand...

You have a SATA drive in there now, right? That makes a difference.

You might try this. I recall I had to do something like that when I added a SATA drive to my computer. I don't remember if I did that or 'map network drive'....but I know I had to do something extra to get it to find the SATA.
 
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