Hard drive not detected on new build

[twinswords]

It has been a few years since I last built a PC. I've done this a couple times in my life, but by no means am I an expert. It's just that I can't stand letting some web site configurator decide what goes in my PC -- and building your own is just a lot more fun. Even the problems can be interesting, sometimes. But now one of those problems has me stumped and I honestly don't know what's wrong.

Here's my machine:

MB: ASUS P6X58D Premium
CPU: Intel i7 930
RAM: G.SKILL (3 x 1GB) DDR3 1333 (G.SKILL 3GB (3 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333)
PSU: CORSAIR CMPSU-750TX 750W
HD: Seagate Barracude 7200 1TB SATA 2

The first time I booted up the machine, POST reported that no hard drive was present -- even though I can see the drive in BIOS. I tried booting up from the Windows 7 disk, but can't install because Windows says the same thing: "No hard drive detected." I selected the Windows 7 setup screen's "format hard drive" option, and Windows said it needed drivers for hard drive drivers before it could proceed.

At this point I checked the Seagate web site, which said that if the Windows disk doesn't recognize the hard drive, you need to install the motherboard's SATA controller drivers. So, I pointed the Windows installer at the motherboard disk, but Windows responded "no drivers detected."

Finally, I decided to try installing Windows XP. I got a little further -- XP let me format the HD (as NTFS), and copied all the installation files to the hard drive -- but after rebooting to begin the actual installation, XP boots up with the same "no hard drive detected" message.

After getting the "no hard drive detected" message during the XP install, I decided to go back to the Windows 7 install since the the hard drive was now at least formatted (in theory) from the XP install. When I got to the point in the Windows 7 install where it asked if I want to upgrade or do a full install (Custom install), when I clicked on Custom install, I got a Windows pop up message that said the Windows 7 installer had failed, and gave an error message of this type: 0x00000440 (this is not the actual error number; this is used for example purposes only; I don't have the actual error number on hand at the moment). It no longer got to the point in the install where it was asking for drivers.

Has anyone had any experience with this type of error? Thanks.

 

[snowgoer1998]

out of curiosity, i don't know if this will help, but what SATA port do you have the HDD plugged into?

If it's not plugged into SATA 0, plug into that port and try again

Also, what HDD mode is activated in the BIOS?

 

[twinswords]

The motherboard doesn't have "0" as an option. The SATA connections on the motherboard are labelled 1-4. The HDD is plugged into SATA 1. In the BIOS, the HDD is the first SATA device listed.

The HDD mode in the BIOS is set to Auto Detect.

 

[banthracis]

In storage configuration menu in the Bios, make sure the SATA drive is not set to IDE.


Also in main menu make sure the device is detected and device information comes up when you highlight and press enter.

 

[twinswords]

In BIOS the SATA drive was set to IDE. I changed it to AHCI and RAID, and both had the same result as before: "No hard drive detected."

The BIOS does detect the drive, and all of the device information looks accurate.

"Regarding this portion of my original post: After getting the "no hard drive detected" message during the XP install, I decided to go back to the Windows 7 install since the the hard drive was now at least formatted (in theory) from the XP install. When I got to the point in the Windows 7 install where it asked if I want to upgrade or do a full install (Custom install), when I clicked on Custom install, I got a Windows pop up message that said the Windows 7 installer had failed, and gave an error message of this type: 0x00000440 (this is not the actual error number; this is used for example purposes only; I don't have the actual error number on hand at the moment). It no longer got to the point in the install where it was asking for drivers."

The Windows error that comes up when I click Custom install is:

Windows installer encountered an unexpected error. Verify that the installation sources are accessible, and restart the installation. Error code" 0xE0000100

 

[twinswords]

The problem has been resolved. It turns out there were two separate issues going on here. The first was the "no hard drive detected" and the second was the Windows 7 install issue.

The Windows 7 install issue was fixed by putting in a different hard drive. Apparently the issue was with the Seagate Barricuda drive I had. The Windows 7 installer apparently doesn't like those drives. (I found other people who had the same drive had the same issues while trying to install Windows 7.)

I'm still getting the "no hard drive detected" message every time the computer boots up; however, I was able to install Windows 7 on my new WD Caviar Black hard drive with no problems, and the computer continues to boot up from that hard drive even though I get the "not detected" error during the boot up sequence.

 

[banthracis]

In BIOS the SATA drive was set to IDE. I changed it to AHCI and RAID, and both had the same result as before: "No hard drive detected."

It should just be outright disabled in configuration options.

See section 3.4.2 in the manual.

 

[twinswords]

Disabling the setting in the BIOS results in the hard drive not being detected for real. It asked for bootable media to be inserted when I disabled the option.

 

[banthracis]

Eh? Nut's wish I had an Asus Bios handy to look at.

Basically what you want is for the Drive to be running as a normal SATA drive. No IDE or RAID enabled. See if there's an option for that.