UPDATED: Hard Drive dead or other issue. Strange Seagate 1TB drive.

[thecoolnessrune]

So me and brother decided to get a new case for our WHS server as our current 6 year old case was getting cramped. We settled on an Antec 900. We have several drives in the server. A 160 and 320GB IDE drive, a 1TB SATA drive, and a 2TB SATA drive. I think the 160GB drive is a WD and all the others are Seagates.

Anyways, we get everything back in and start up WHS and lo and behold its a mess. Our 1TB drive is not showing up and as such the system is crippled. It's not a terrible thing because we have duplication, so we only lost a few trivial files (and easily replaced), however, it does set us up for a catastrophe later on if we don't get another replacement drive in there.

Before we do though, we're trying to figure out what's happened. It seems too convenient that the drive just so happened to fail when we were moving things to a new case.

And here's where things get weirder. When we hook the drive up to our SATA -> USB external case the drive is easily detected and usable. We can see the data and everything.

We thought maybe motherboard issue but we can hook a different drive into the same SATA port and its detected just fine.

We then thought power supply but even with everything but bare essentials disconnected the motherboard still can't find the drive.

So to recap, the drive can be seen on a Windows PC when connected to an external case but can NOT be seen when connected directly to a computer. What on earth is going on here?

Oh, and we used Seatools for Windows on the drive while it was in the external case and it tested just fine.

Later on this afternoon we're going to head to work to the test bed machines to see if any of the BIOS's can detect the drive.

This has us baffled. Any ideas?

EDIT: Also tried SATA cable and power cable going to a known working drive to ensure it wasn't cables. Drive still wasn't detected so I know it isn't a cable issue.

 

[thecoolnessrune]

So we tried clearing the CMOS, and suddenly all drives are detected. Every one of them. It seems that every time the computer starts up from a shut down the drives are not detected. If we go into the BIOS, set the drive mode to AHCI, save settings and restart, go back back into BIOS and set the mode back to IDE, the drives are all detected again.

What gives. Is this the motherboard going bad? Or is the fact the this only happens from a cold shut down still a sign that the PSU doesn't have the power to start up 5 HDDs? The PSU is a Seasonic S-12 430 watt model from ~2005 if that helps.

 

[RebateMonger]

Replace the CMOS battery, just in case. The battery should be about $2. If the battery is dead, everything will be fine until you disconnect the power to the box (like when you changed cases). Once the CMOS loses power (dead battery), it'll start forgetting things.

1) Unplug PC
2) Remove CMOS battery
3) Short out CMOS jumper temporarily
4) Insert new CMOS battery
5) Start up and set BIOS as needed

 

[Paperlantern]

So we tried clearing the CMOS, and suddenly all drives are detected. Every one of them. It seems that every time the computer starts up from a shut down the drives are not detected. If we go into the BIOS, set the drive mode to AHCI, save settings and restart, go back back into BIOS and set the mode back to IDE, the drives are all detected again.

What gives. Is this the motherboard going bad? Or is the fact the this only happens from a cold shut down still a sign that the PSU doesn't have the power to start up 5 HDDs? The PSU is a Seasonic S-12 430 watt model from ~2005 if that helps.

This all depends on the drives, how much they draw, and how much the rest of the machine draws, I wouldnt think its a PSU issue, BUT, it wouldnt hurt to get a newer one honestly, a 5 year old PSU, rated at what I would consider bare minimum for handling a server with 5 hard drives and who knows how many fans (i would assume AT LEAST one case fan if not more). My server runs with a 250 W, but its also about 9 years old and only runs 2 drives, and one additional case fan along with the exhaust fan in the PSU itself. The PSU has never needed replacing, but Ive always thought about getting a better one. Just never did.

 

[thecoolnessrune]

That's a great idea about the CMOS battery. We'll definitely try that next. Most of the HDDs are higher power use (.6 amps for 4 of them), with our new 2TB drive taking a mere .25 amps on the 12V rail.

We wanted to add one more 2TB drive, but that will need to wait if the mobo or PSU needs replaced.