Is this a motherboard problem?

[murban135]

On initial boot the hard drive is not detected and I get a "primary hard disk failure" message during POST. I pulled the hard drive and put it in another system and sure enough it is dead.

Then I put a known good hard drive, with a new IDE cable in the problem computer. It detects the hard drive but still gives me the same "primary hard disk failure" message.

Then I booted the problem system from a Knoppix CD and it boots fine. I can see the known good hard drive and navigate to folders (and sub folders) on the hard drive but not open any files. My guess is that it is a bad motherboard (bad drive controller)? Any other opinions?

 

[RichUK]

Originally posted by: murban135
On initial boot the hard drive is not detected and I get a "primary hard disk failure" message during POST. I pulled the hard drive and put it in another system and sure enough it is dead.

Then I put a known good hard drive, with a new IDE cable in the problem computer. It detects the hard drive but still gives me the same "primary hard disk failure" message.

Then I booted the problem system from a Knoppix CD and it boots fine. I can see the known good hard drive and navigate to folders (and sub folders) on the hard drive but not open any files. My guess is that it is a bad motherboard (bad drive controller)? Any other opinions?

Possibily ... you should have two IDE channels 0 and 1 (on the mother board not the slave connector on the IDE cable)... have you tried both?

 

[murban135]

Originally posted by: RichUK

Originally posted by: murban135
On initial boot the hard drive is not detected and I get a "primary hard disk failure" message during POST. I pulled the hard drive and put it in another system and sure enough it is dead.

Then I put a known good hard drive, with a new IDE cable in the problem computer. It detects the hard drive but still gives me the same "primary hard disk failure" message.

Then I booted the problem system from a Knoppix CD and it boots fine. I can see the known good hard drive and navigate to folders (and sub folders) on the hard drive but not open any files. My guess is that it is a bad motherboard (bad drive controller)? Any other opinions?

Possibily ... you should have two IDE channels 0 and 1 (on the mother board not the slave connector on the IDE cable)... have you tried both?

I did try the second IDE channel and had the same problems

 

[Fern]

If you're familiar with your BIOS settings, clear the CMOS and see if it'll bring it back.

Fern