Hard drive no longer detected after new installed

Discussion in 'Computer Science & Culture' started by Giambattista, Sep 26, 2008.

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  1. Giambattista sssssssssssssssssssssssss sssss Valued Senior Member

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    Had a second hard drive installed a number of years ago. Don't remember off the top of my head the brand, but I think it was Seagate or Western Digital.
    Had a C drive failure several years ago. Had it replaced. On another occasion, reinstalled OS and reformatted the C drive due to sluggishness, etc. Each of those two times, our other drive showed up as usual with little fuss. First time it was designated H: and it was renamed D: automatically at a later date.

    Well, our latest C: just went kaputz last week, and we took it to a local computer shop which was able to salvage documents from it (though my opera bookmarks were not included in that, guess I didn't ask them to, which is shitty because a good roster of bookmarks takes a long time to accumulate!).

    Got the computer back today, hooked it all up, and now, our other hard drive is no longer showing up. The OS wasn't loading because of the C: drive, and they transferred documents from it and replaced it, ay... they gave the old drive back to us, and the new one is loaded and works. The diagnostic sheet/bill statement made absolutely no mention of the other disk. I assume that it is still there, but no longer recognized.

    I am currently reading about what could possibly be wrong. The last time we replaced the C: drive, this didn't happen. I don't know why the repair people didn't check to make sure that the other drive was showing up. They didn't say anything about it at all.

    Calling them tomorrow to get their opinion. In the meantime, anyone have any suggestions?

    I'm tempted to remove the cover and see if the hard drive is actually still there. Don't know why it wouldn't be, but...
     
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  3. CheskiChips Banned Banned

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    Hard drives have PIN configurations. The one with your operating system is the "Master" and the other one is the "Slave". On the HD should be printed instructions on how to set the pins to make them valid for there parts.
    *You will find them next to the location where the serial cable is plugged in*

    Check these configurations.

    Always make sure your computer is completely powered down before removing components
     
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  5. Giambattista sssssssssssssssssssssssss sssss Valued Senior Member

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    Thanks for the reply.

    I am aware of master/slave settings. The drive in question was never the master drive. It never disappeared with any other instance of either reformatting or replacing the main disk. Unless someone either removed it or intentionally changed its settings during the installation of the main drive, I don't know why it would not show up, unless there was damage or something went wrong with its connection when the other one was replaced, and no one thought to check for it.

    I really feel like looking inside the computer to see if it's still there.

    I wonder if there is a way to check if it's attached, but isn't being recognized. I think there is, but I have had trouble finding the correct procedure.
     
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  7. MacGyver1968 Fixin' Shit that Ain't Broke Valued Senior Member

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    Go to control panel/administrative tools/computer management/storage/disk management.

    See if the hard drive shows up there. If it doesn't have a partition, it won't show up in Explorer. You might need to initialize the disk, (it will prompt you if you do).


    If it doesn't show up there...I would next restart the machine, and hit F1 or F2 or esc..or whatever button to get into your bios setup, and make sure the drive is seen there, and is turned on.

    If it doesn't show up there...I'd pop the case, and take a look inside to make sure it connected. I know sometimes I disconnect secondary drives on machines before installing windows, to ensure the windows install program assigns the boot drive the letter "C:"....if not, sometimes it will assign the boot drive another letter, and it can cause issues with programs that assume your main drive is lettered C:.

    Did you say you already checked the jumpers on the drive...if you did, I guess you can disregard step 3 as you have already done this.

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    Hopefully your drive just hasn't died.

    Let us know how it turns out.
     
    Last edited: Sep 26, 2008
  8. Giambattista sssssssssssssssssssssssss sssss Valued Senior Member

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    From my observation, after opening up the case, it appears someone disconnected the second hard drive. What the motivation was is up for debate.
     
  9. kevinalm Registered Senior Member

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    Most likely it was done to protect the contents of the secondary drive during windows installation. Windows has a bad habit of messing with stuff it shouldn't. And then they just forgot to plug it back in.
     
  10. Giambattista sssssssssssssssssssssssss sssss Valued Senior Member

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    A-Ok. They fixed it within 30 minutes.

    Guess I expected a little more competence, though apparently they have a ton of business, so it was probably a rush job to begin with.

    :sleep:
     
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