Bios does not see hard drive

[Roanantelope]

The bios does not see hard drive. the types are all on auto. The automatic HDD detection also picks up nothing.
Roanantelope

I omitted to mention I have a copied hard drive which I kept for emergencies like this. Changing hard drives does not change the situation. Could it be a fault on the mother board?

Rom PCI/ISA Bios 2a6lcd4f
Hard drive. Western Digital WD400
Pentium iii motherboard. Cannot see any other markings on board.

 

[spawnkiller]

What motherboard, what bios on it, what hard drive ?? Please give your machine specs then we'll be able to answer you accuratly...

 

[random stalker]

it's always good to check the drive mode in bios...
also, check if both cables /data and power/ are securely connected to your hdd...
also - try to change your position of the hdd...
also - if you have an older computer /ata disc/, be sure you have only one master and one slave drive on the same data cable /check your jumper settings/...
from time to time it happens that certain drives don't like each other - changing them and finding the only working setting is a pain in the butt, but sometimes you have to try that...


also - your hdd might be fubar...

 

[Roanantelope]

it's always good to check the drive mode in bios...
also, check if both cables /data and power/ are securely connected to your hdd...
also - try to change your position of the hdd...
also - if you have an older computer /ata disc/, be sure you have only one master and one slave drive on the same data cable /check your jumper settings/...
from time to time it happens that certain drives don't like each other - changing them and finding the only working setting is a pain in the butt, but sometimes you have to try that...


also - your hdd might be fubar...

 

[Roanantelope]

Random Stalker, you are a star. If I change over the position of the main drive and leave the slave disconnected the system runs up perfectly. If I replace the slave plug the fault re-occurs. If you could explain about checking the drive mode in bios, I would be most grateful. If you don't hear from me tonight I will be on line first thing tomorrow. This is one of our very important computers as it is used to drive the security x-ray machines. Roanantelope.

 

[random stalker]

Random Stalker, you are a star. If I change over the position of the main drive and leave the slave disconnected the system runs up perfectly. If I replace the slave plug the fault re-occurs. If you could explain about checking the drive mode in bios, I would be most grateful. If you don't hear from me tonight I will be on line first thing tomorrow. This is one of our very important computers as it is used to drive the security x-ray machines. Roanantelope.

Well, since you're using ATA drives, it will not be applicable to you. But since every question deserves an answer - the BIOS drive mode lets you to switch between two modes of communication for the newer SATA hard drives - AHCI (an Intel made standard which supports greater speeds and many newer functions like TRIM which is vital for SSD at the cost of compatibility) and IDE (which is a WD standard supported by any OS which lacks any newer feature)...

Now back to your hard drives. Since some play well with each other and some not - sometimes it helps when you set one drive to cable select (CS) and other to slave (the CS master drive goes at the end of the cable, slave in the middle). Sometimes it works other way (CS as slave, master as master). Two CS don't like each other, but you're welcome to try...
Also, some hard drives love to be master and won't work other way (had a maxtor drive like that).

But if everything else fails, you can always connect the data HDD to the second IDE cable (even if it's not recommended to put a drive on the same cable as the CD ROM, but, if it helps...)