System BIOS Won't Recognize My Western Digital 100G 7200RPM Drive

[DLH13]

I have a K7S5A Motherboard with a Western Digital 100G 7200RPM Drive - it was working fine with my AMD Athlon XP 2200+ but when I swapped in a AMD Athlon 2400+ it now will not recognize the drive (it will recognize the slave maxtor drive). Is this a known problem? Any tips appreciated.

 

[billbobagens]

I have had different problems with the western digital drives it seems odd but try removing the jumper from the drive that you set for it being a master drive I know I have done this and it seems to make the drive work

 

[DLH13]

Thanks Billbobagens I tried it but it didn't work but thanks for trying to help - my life is on that drive I need to get it back soon.

 

[glammagod]

I had the same problem with K7S5A motherboard and it drove me mad! Can get it to recognise the HD every so often but it must be a common fault on that m/board! I would do what I did and bin it and treat yourself to a decent ASUS board!

If you really need to get it to work try clear the CMOS and try connecting the HD and nothing else! If that doesn't work have a fiddle with the drive jumpers! if that doesn't work, you could have a faulty ribbon cabel or EVEN a faulty drive!

 

[glammagod]

You might want to check this forum I posted a while back!

thread602-510909

 

[DLH13]

Thanks Glammagod. I have reset bios and tried the drive alone with jumpers set as single - no luck. I have tried a number of jumper settings without success and tried a new cable. When I have the system autodetect when I'm in Bios edit mode it comes back with numbers that are correct except for the number of cyls - My mboard won't let me set the individual drive settings in the bios even though the documentation implies otherwise. The frustrating part is that it all worked just fine with the AMD 2200+ befire I swapped in the 2400+ (I guess I should have left it alone). Any other ideas appreciated. Is there a way to get the drive tested or repaired withour costing a bundle?

 

[MilwTD]

It's an old trick, but did you try limiting cylnders?
You should not have to but sometimes it has been a butt saver.

 

[DLH13]

Thanks for the tip MilwTD but can someone tell me how to limit cylinders?

 

[channing0123]

If you don't want to spend extra money on it, try to return and change another brand such as Sea**t or Ma**r.

Or you really like to upgrade your HD, you could install a "IDE control card". It's about $50~100.

I believe once you install IDE control card that will solve all your problem.

 

[MilwTD]

Limiting the cylinders is usually done by putting a second jumper on the drive to fool the bios into thinking the drive is physically smaller in MB smaller than it really is.


You still have the same mother board and only changed the processor. That's what makes this so strange.

Do you have access to another computer that will recognize the drive? If so set it as a slave and use Norton Ghost or another program to burn a backup. If that doesn't work it maybe that the drive is about to head south.

If it still won'T be recognized there is a trick that you can use. Take the Harddrive and put it in the freezer overnight (I'm not kidding you can check this out on Tech Republic) Then hook it up and immediately transfer all the files off of it. This is a last chance option. It doesn't hurt the drive, but only seems to work the first time for recovery.

 

[glammagod]

Try and test the HD out on another machine see if it works! Or try another HD on the m/board?
Your local computer store will test the HD on the machine for a small price and should give you some advice!

 

[DLH13]

Thanks for all of the suggestions - I've tried them all but no luck. When I switched to the 2400+ the first one was bad (would shut down right away). The second one worked but doesn't recognize the drive. I wonder if the first bad CPU shorted something out on the drive. I think the drive is bad now - any suggestions on ways to get the data off - should I send it back to Western Digital or will they just send me an empty drive back? Any ideas for a service that could help would be appreciated.