gigabyte ga7n400pro2: updated bios now it wont find sata hd 1

[calous3]

Hi again

I updated the bios from f2 - f6 bios was successful.

but as it went through the boot up sequence it kept asking for a system disk.
Fiddled around for a while still no joy.
Put the winxp disk in at the f6 screen installed the sata drivers. then it found the disk and all its partitions. when it had finished loading files restarted but instead of bootoing from the hd went straight back to trying to install windows again.

I have now reflashed the bios back to version f2, but still no joy. The hard drive is seagate barracuda 120gb sata150

Please help i have never come across anything like this before.

Regards Lee

 

[koala15]

Hi.

What are the Boot Devices specified in the BIOS (in order)?

What happens if the only boot device is the HDD?

When you say that " .... instead of booting from the hd went straight back to trying to install windows again." Can you supply more details - what messages / windows are being displayed.

Cheers.

"Life is full of learning, and then there is wisdom"

 

[calous3]

Hi

When windows has copied the files to the hard drive and then restarts it does so from the hd.

But this just went back into installing the initial files i.e kernal and keyboard.

The message was windows was hecking the configuration as if it was a new install.

In the bios the 1t boot hd,2nd hd, 3rd cd rom.

but if there is a non system cd rom in it just asks for a system disk. when prior to the bios flash windows was fully installed along with all the drivers for the system.

I appologise if this message is a bit hit and miss but its all ive got.

Lee

 

[koala15]

Lee,

1) Try changing the boot sequence to just the HDD, disable the rest and ensure that there is no CD in the Cd drive. What happens on boot up?

2) For some reason XP may think it has not comleted the install - is there a reason why you can't let it just complete what it thinks it needs to do?

"Life is full of learning, and then there is wisdom"

 

[calous3]

hi

it isn't even recognising there is a hard drive there.

lee

 

[koala15]

Lee,

As Sherlock Holmes would say .... "interesting, Dr Watson".

Enough of the english lit, lets go:

Does the disk drive show up in the BIOS?

If not check all your h/w connections (power, data).

If it does then find a WIN98 boot diskette and put fdisk on it (if it does not have it there already). (Note, if fdisk is not on the diskette make sure you copy it from a W98 system otherwise you will have version incompatability problems).

If you have a friend with a W98 system, the boot diskette is simple to create via the control panel, and fdisk is localted in the "command" folder withing the "windows" folder.

Once booted to the diskette, run fdisk and see if the disk shows up in the partition display, menu item number 4.

Please repost with the result.

Cheers.

PS: I apologise if I am making the instruction simple but I don't know your experience level.

"Life is full of learning, and then there is wisdom"