My computer won't detect drives :( Any ideas ?

Toxteth_OGrady

Strong smell of bullsh1t from the repair guy. :eek:

One cheap way to check it out would be to get a yourself a couple of new IDE cables from here (I'm assuming your disks are IDE not SATA).

Disconnect both your disks and any CD or DVD optical drives.

Connect the disk containing the OS (your C drive) with one of the new cables to one of the motherboard IDE controller sockets. Ensure the drive is jumpered to either Master or Cable Select.

Check it boots every time. If not try it connected to the other motherboard IDE socket.

If that's ok connect the second disk (your D drive) with the second new cable to the other motherboard IDE socket. Make sure this disk is jumpered to either Master or Cable Select.

If this all works you can probably eliminate motherboard or psu as the problem.

Download an application like Speedfan that will allow you to health check your disks by reading the S.M.A.R.T. data (providing you have S.M.A.R.T. enabled in the BIOS).

If you do find you do have a hardware problem with one of the IDE headers on your mobo then a cheaper option than replacing your mobo would be to get a pci IDE controller card like [url=
http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/specpage.html?NOV-ATA133]this[/url] if you have any spare pci slots.

:cool:

TOG

johnmc

Sounds like he has changed the boot order in the BIOS to read the CD first. That will give the C drive time to spin up before the BIOS gives up on the CD and switches to the C drive.

I have come across this before with the same "fix". The answer was a new C drive, I'm afraid.

But first check that the hard drives' jumpers at the back are set correctly for Master / Slave. I would suggest setting the C as Master and D as slave rather than cable select.

Disconnect the IDE cable on the D drive. On booting go into the BIOS and do an auto select. Should find the C drive and the CD rom.

Reconnect the D drive and autoselect again. Is it found?

As BingoBango says you can get similar issues when your power supply is on it's way out. It's like trying to run a car with a kink in the fuel supply line. When you're pottering around town it's fine, take it flat out and it will splutter and stop. Leave a few seconds and it will start up ok.

To check for this unplug everything from the PC except the monitor, mouse and keyboard (including the D drive and all but one strip of RAM). Start it up and do some basic tasks.

Now shut down and add all your bits, starting with the printer. Reboot and send a nice big file to it.

Good luck.

Jon_C

Were your drives tarmacked?