where is my hard drive?

1853 Views 3 Replies 3 Participants Last post by Volt-Schwibe, Apr 26, 2003

resolnaisa

Discussion Starter · Apr 26, 2003

i'm using windows 98, the hard drive is a western digital (40 gb). the computer is recognizing the presence of the drive but i can't access it in any way. when i get into cmos setup it lists the drive as being there in the second slot (i know because the size is correct), and it also recognizes it in the ide hd detection thing. also, during the bootup sequence it shows the drive listed as the primary slave. but it's not listed in my computer, and there's no other way of accessing it. i eventually decided to format and install the drive with the installation disk to see if that would solve the problem. it didn't, yet files were placed on the drive, because when my father followed the exact same procedure again, it asked him if he wanted to overwrite the files on the drive (which were the DOS system files that the program had just asked me if i wanted to put on the drive). i then thought that it could be something to do with the cmos config values, but nothing changed after setting them to what it says in the installation packet (although it says that BIOS SHOULD put the right values in automatically). ironically, the help file for my drive on westerndigital.com lists different values for the # of cylinders, heads, etc, but that didn't work either. does anyone have any idea why i can't access this drive?

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fgreco

· #2 · Apr 26, 2003

well...

Ok first thing off what are the stats of your computer the megahertz and such. Tell me all of that and then I will be able to help you. Now if you have a very old pc what I would do is take it to a computer shot they have these cards that make the computer recognize the HD so you will then be able to access it but, that is only if the computer was made before the HD was made but in a lot of cases the computer will take the HD anywayz.

I'am really talking about a old PC like a 486 or intel 586 100mghtz or less.

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resolnaisa

Discussion Starter · #3 · Apr 26, 2003

It's a Pentium III, 450 Mhz with 192 MB of ram. As a note, this hard drive has been used on the computer before; I had to format my drive with the OS on it and now that I've installed Windows 98 again it won't recognize this second drive.

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Volt-Schwibe

· #4 · Apr 26, 2003

second drive?

im not sure you mentioned that it was a second drive having troubles.

i am wondering, is this a situation where you added a drvie and didnt set the jumpers?

what all drives are on your machine?

is it anything like this?

like IDE 1 Master= hard disk 0
Slave = hard disk 1

IDE 2 Master =cdrom
Slave = cd burner

or do you have a single drive partitioned, and you are having trouble accessing the second partition?

or is it a single hard disk on master...
and a single hard disk on slave?

you need to be a little more descriptive of your problem.

if this is the problem i think it is you didnt state it right, and people are likely to be confused.

please restate what type of hard disk(S) you are running, and what channel they are on, and what the jumpers are set at on them

your machine is newer than mine, and it would detect that drive, so i don't think that is the problem you are having...

~BoB~

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