New hard drive not recognized in BIOS

[TomC25]

Thanks to the heads up here I got the WD 45GB drive from Circuit City

I am just now trying to install it

I connect it all up as master so I can partition and format

The manual says position "A" for single master

The label on the drive says position "B" for single master

Upon boot up with position "A" when it says "detecting primary master" is sits there, it hangs

If I change the jumper to position "B" it says "none" and lets me boot to floppy

I have another hard drive and connected it up with same cable and it is recognized, switched back and still cannot recognize the new drive

Whats funny is if I hit F4 when it is detecting with position "A" it will boot to floppy, and I can use the floppy that came with the drive and it tells me it is partitioned and formatted but I still cannot recognize it

Can anyone help

Thanks

 

[Horsepower]

I assume your mobo bios is up to date and you have read this: Info

 

[TomC25]

I bought the board (Abit Bx6 r2) in May '99 - have not done a BIOS update because i did not think I needed to

I have read that info in the manual about the jumper settings

I have tried many settings and with no jumper at all

When I go into CMOS and try to detect the drive it still wont

When I manually set parameters it wont let me boot to floppy

aaaahhhhhh

 

[SUOrangeman]

I'm thinking this can be solved by a different jumper configuration.

Have you tried putting the new HD on the IDE cable by itself? Tried both IDE connectors on that cable? I think I have the same drive (405AA?) and have noticed similar quirks ... but my drive is working (currently has primary-slave).

-SUO

 

[TomC25]

yes, it is is the same drive

I have tried using it as slave to the drive that I can detect, still wont detect

I have taken apart my system and put it back together with only processor, RAM, video, floppy, and single hard drive - still wont detect

SO, if I can detect my 6GB drive fine then switch to the 45GB and it doesnt detect, could the 45GB drive be defective?

I sure wish it isnt

I dont have another system to test it out in

 

[TomC25]

thanks for the suggestions

does anyone have any other advice or suggestions

thanks

 

[DaddyG]

Maybe you have one of the following problems:

1: Your BIOS does not support INT13 extensions, limiting the size to 8gig.

2: You need to use the IBM utility to set the drive to ATA33 mode, your mobo probably only supports ATA33 not ATA66.

3: Your HDD cable is defective.

 

[Mojonba]

According to IBM, Award 4.5x bios is has a 33GB HardDrive Limit.

You have to options use Ontrack Disk Overlay (explained in IBM's site) or do yourself and your mobo a favor and update the Bios. Version NW supportd disks 40GB and over.

 

[TomC25]

Thanks Mojonba1

I will download the new BIOS and install tonight at home

I am hoping it is a BIOS problem and not the drive - I have tried another cable

 

[Mem]

Your last option is a Promise ATA-66/100 controller card, my friend could not get is drive to work on his motherboard(some weird unknown brand) anyway it work with the Promise card ,I believe they can detect HD up to 128GB with no problems.

 

[TomC25]

another option, cool

thanks for all the replies, I have learned some things

 

[TomC25]

ITS WORKING GREAT

I flashed my motherboard BIOS to the latest one and hooked up the new drive. It was detected right away.

I Installed Win98 and everything went fine

Thanks to all whe replied