Hard drive not seen on restart

[Ken Moore]

I think this is a hardware (or firmware) issue but it's something I've never come across before so any ideas would be appreciated.

The machine in question had problems (disk corruption - which may be a clue) and so I've put a new hard disk in it and reinstalled an OS - XPpro - and then SP2. That's about all that's gone on it so far.

It boots up and shuts down with no problems except that if I ask it to do a restart, it first recognises the HDD (on IDE-0) but can't find (after a long time) any boot data and then on ctrl/alt/del, it can't detect the HDD.

Turn off the power and on again and there's no problem and no apparent corruption.

As I've initmated the HDD is on IDE (primary/master) with master selected on the jumper. It's a DiamondMax Plus9 80GB UDMA133 and the mobo probably runs at 100MHz (is that a problem?).

The machine runs a 2.5GHz P4 on a GA-8SIML mobo with AMIBIOS, 512MB DDR266 memory.

I've done simple things like changing the IDE cable to no effect so any idea would be appreciated.

My next step, unless anyone comes up with anything better, is to strip out the few components in it (graphics card / modem (CNR?)) and see if I can get it working properly. Maybe see if there's an update for the BIOS.

Although it has a graphics card I see there is a graphics connector on the mobo, although I can find nothing in the BIOS about enabling/disabling it.

[Reverend]

Is the HDD detected correctly in the BIOS?

[bhxtyrant]

It boots up and shuts down with no problems except that if I ask it to do a restart, it first recognises the HDD (on IDE-0) but can't find (after a long time) any boot data and then on ctrl/alt/del, it can't detect the HDD.

I had this same issue aboiut a two months ago,sadly i could not find any way to solve the problem.At first i thought the Hard Drive was going bad because it happened exactly as you described it.The PC would boot fine and work fine then if i attempted to restart once it begins loading i would get the "cannot find boot data" error ctrl+alt+del and it would start up fine once again.

If possible i would try another spare hard drive,It seemed to have fixed my problem at the time.I do not think that UDMA133 at 100MHz would be the issue as the mobo usually sets the HDD to run at the correct max speed by default.

It's strange that it is happening on a fresh install of XP,in my case it occured on a copy of XP pro SP2 that had been installed for 2 years.The more i think about it the more i am suspecting that it could be a hard drive issue.If possible i would try swapping to a spare hard drive.This is just my opinion :)

I would still wait for other TZ members to reply before proceeding as they are much more knowledgable then I.

[Ken Moore]

I suppose I could try another HDD, although the one I've used here is brand new. At least if it works with another drive it would suggest that it's not a mobo problem.

I did once have a problem which was only slightly related in that it wouldn't boot when switched on but was then OK after a ctrl/alt/del. That turned out to be to do with timing in the system and a tweak in the BIOS sorted it. In this case, the problem is the other way round! It starts from cold but won't restart!

If I could be certain that it's just not able to restart, rather than there's something wrong which could destroy the data, I could live with it!

[Ken Moore]

to Reverend: When starting from cold, the disk looks fine in the BIOS.

When it does a restart it detects Pri Master = IDE Hard Disk and then goes to sleep for a long time then shows Pri Master = (this Maxtor disk), SMART Capable but disabled then after another pause it clears the screen and then spends some time "Searching for boot record from IDE-0" until "..Not Found", then it suggests I insert an appropriate boot medium.

Ctrl/Alt/Del reboots but in the error state but this time has Pri Master not detected.

I am unable (AFAICT) to get into the BIOS setup from here - or maybe it just takes too long.

If I switch off and on again, it boots up OK and I can get into the BIOS setup.

I've changing the boot process to boot only from IDE-0 and not to try other devices to remove obfuscating issues.

[egghead]

Ken,

It sounds like a simple power management problem in the bios

under power management in the bios set it to default.

If you continue to get the error it is a bios problem with that hard drive bios chip (firmware)

I would be very interested to hear your results from another hard drive as suggested

[Ken Moore]

Well, I've duplicated the work I did with a new drive (80Gb Maxtor) on an older drive (40Gb Maxtor) and encounter no problems!

One slight difference was that on the original (problem) disk I created a primary partition of 20Gb and installed XPpro into that. I then Allocated the remaining 60Gb as a new primary partition. On the trial disk (which worked) I allocated its full 40Gb as the primary partition into which I installed XP and then resized it to 20Gb and created a new primary partition of 20Gb.

I can't believe that this is really relevant but I might as well redo the test creating the partitions in the same way before sending the new disk back and getting a replacement.

The queston is, is it likely to be a dodgy specimen or a problem associated with that particular model? It's a Maxtor DiamondMax Plus9 80GB UDMA133.


This particular BIOS doesn't seem to give me very much of interest in Power Management. Currently it's set to its defaults of...

- ACPI Sleep type = S3
- Suspecn Time Out = Disabled
- Resume on Ring = Enabled
- Resume on PME# = Enabled
- Power Button Function = Suspend
- Restore on AC/Power Loss = Power Off
- Resume on RTC Alarm = Disabled

[rik]

Like has been suggested, resetting the BIOS to it's Default settings never hurts. You might also try disconnecting all other IDE devices, then connect the hdd alone onto IDE 2. Then try your boot testing again. At least this can narrow down your troubleshooting to the issue being just with the hdd \cable.

[Ken Moore]

As I said, I did reset the BIOS to default setting with no noticable difference. Trying the drive on a different IDE channel seemed like a good idea so I've done that and with it as Secondary master it behaves in exactly the same way.

I guess the drive needs to get replaced.

[rik]

Try downloading the Maxtor diags from their website to see if it finds anything. They are always handy to have around.

http://www.maxtor.com/portal/site/Maxtor/menuitem.8db0c3d6932ced37294198b091346068/?channelpath=/en_us/Support/Software%20Downloads

[Ken Moore]

OK, I've got the Max Diags and run a test (once it could actually see the drive) and it's come up with a problem, diagnostic code dc98d465 (whatever that means). The drive's certainly going back now!

[egghead]

glad to hear you got it figured out

[bhxtyrant]

Glad to hear you fixed the problem,This furthers my idea on my old drive being bad all along.Wish i had found it out sooner lol.Good luck.