Not sure what the problem is - help needed

[bluegnu]

I'm really confused as to what exactly the problem is with my sister's PC.

I'm not totally sure what hardward is being used, other than it's an Athlon processor.

When it was switched on it wasn't recognising the HDD, so I assumed it was a HDD problem. I opened it up and found that it has 2 HDD's, so I switched over the cables so the slave was now the master.

I the formatted the drive and reinstalled Windows ME. When I ran Windows, I went to explorer and low and behold both HDD's were shown and the one which I thought was bust had all the information on it, not bad cluster, no lost files, working perfectly.

So I thought great and proceeded to copy files over from the old c drive to the new one. Then I have just rebooted and teh new C drive is not recognised! But Windows ME was installed from the old C Drive (now thw slave drive).

I'm thinking now that it isn't a HDD problem. I believe both the HDD's are fujitsu.

Not sure what the motherboard is.

Has anyone got any ideas what the problem could be and how I can test what the problem is? (I've done a complete virus scan)

 

[Kjonnnn]

First.. switching the place on the ribbon does determine slave or master. You've got to change the jumper settings on each drive.

Second make sure you set the primary drive active

 

[LANmass]

Yes, Kjonnnn is correct. Jumpers must be moved to switch Master/Slave settings.
I would also try swapping the IDE cable out for a new one. I've seen numerous (random, occasional) problems that were fixed by simply replacing the cable.
If you want to test the HDD themselves, find out who makes them and head to the manufacturer website. They should have free diagnostic software available to troubleshoot suspect drives.

 

[mdengtek]

If it recognized both Hard Drives, before you copied all the files, I would suspect a software problem. Could just be a corrupt io.sys file that you copied from 1 drive to the other.

 

[bluegnu]

Thanks for the responses.

Couple of points I omitted. First I did change the jumpers and second it was a new install, I didn't copy the OS files.

What is the io,sys file?

Would an upgrade of the bios help?

 

[Dingusm]

Be VERY careful! Flashing the bios is a good way to kill a computer if you don't do it right. You have to get the EXACT bios code from the mobo manufacturer, and it has to be done EXACTLY as the manufacturer instructs. I've killed a couple of boards in this manner.
Before resorting to something as radical as this, try resetting the bios. Somewhere on the mobo is a jumper that will remove the power from the cmos memory. Unplug the computer and remove this jumper. Leave it off for a few minutes then replace it. The bios should reset to the default state. This is also a good time to check/replace the cmos battery. You might try removing the extra HDD altogether until you get things sorted out.

Good luck!

 

[bluegnu]

I think I've worked out what has happened. There is a thread on these forums which states the the Fujitsu MPG3102AT has known problems and they should have been recalled or something.

thread489-375573 contacted my supplier to see if I can get any change out of them!

Thanks for all your help, I think I'll leave teh bios alone for a while