Sony Vaio drives not registered in BIOS

[711782]

This Sony Vaio desktop, M\No PCV RS 420,
is a Intel based PC it has a DVD R-RW drive a 512 mb of ddr 3200 ram, and run on a 2800 ghz CPU, I bought this PC in "as is" condition with no Hdd,
I was told that the Hdd was taken out cause of data in it, no further explanation was given,
I said to myself this is a piece of cake to fix. Well not so fast buddy...
I started by installing a brand new Hdd, set it to master (formated it on my spare test Rig) cheked all the cables for a positive fix,
also I double checkd that the optical drives where pinned correctly,
Then carefully vacuum the scum dust out of it.
When everything was set just right, I proceeded to boot it and check the BIOS setting (F2 key) to make sure it boot to CD.
Here is when the troubles started, the computer boots fine, the video card has no issue, there is just one normal short beep upon booting, sony logo and gingle is there, the BIOS is acceseble easely,
but it doesn't recognize the Hdd, CD or floppy drive, nothing is there, the Bios is easely navigable and all the switches works.
I setted the Bios to defaults but still no luck,
I'm begining to suspect that the Mobo is gone south it seems to have a IDE issue.

 

[64AMD]

First you if the Hard drive is the only IDE device on the cable the drive should be set as a stand alone or single drive. Some hard drives Master setting is also the single drive but not all of them.

If you only have one cd drive on the cable it is connect to then it should be master or Cable Select.

Make sure all cables, data and power are tight. Make sure the IDE cable is also tight in the Mobo connector. Try different cables.

Try different power supply cables.

If nothing else works, you can purchase an IDE PCI expansion card. You may need to disable the mobo IDE controllers in BIOS.

 

[711782]

64AMD Thx for the response but I've already done all of that stuff several times over,
I mean the checking of the cables etc as I stated in my post.I've several Promise IDE expansion cards in a box, but even if the card works and it read the Hdd then what? I still need a optical drive to load the system files and drivers etc. the expansion cards won't read CD Roms it never has and never will!They are mainly designed for one or more Hdd to add on.I was thinking of flashing the BIOS but the floppy is not recognized ether.
Too bad such a fantastic case and the thing isn't working,
I just might go to Fry's electronic and see if I can find a MoBo that fit this case.

 

[paparazi]

I'm not sure if was the exact same model but I diagnosed none detecting roms on a friends Vaio a few months back and put it down to a bad motherboard (he didn't want me to repair it as the system was still under warranty)
That was also a 2.8 P4 with very similar if not identical specs to yours.
He returned it to Staples and after a couple of months it was indeed, returned fitted with a new mainboard.
The comment from them was that it was a fairly common issue on this particular Vaio
I guess two faulty don't make a trend but apparently they had a few with the same issue.
Martin

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[711782]

Paparazi Thx for that info I'll look into that.
I'll call Sony and see what they have to say about this.