HELP : PC suddenly does not recognize my hard disks

[imported_Jubei]

Major PC disaster encountered last night!

As I was surfing the web and listening to music with foobar in the background, and when I launched Excel, my PC suddenly froze and crashed - I got a blue screen of death - and on re-start, bios says I have no hard disk installed!! (I have 2 internal WD hard disks)

I tried swapping new SATA cables as well as using a different power rail. The problem did not go away. Today, I bought a new Seagate hard disk, installed it but bios still does not recognize it. When I put my hand on the hard disk, I think I feel them vibrating just a little, so I think the hard disks are at least spinning.

My guess is that the SATA controller has died on me. Any ideas on how I can know for sure what the problem is? And if it is the SATA controller's problem, does this mean time for a new board (thus new system as I am still on socket 939)?

 

[Old Hippie]

Any yellow question marks in the device manager? More than one SATA controller, or different ports to try?

 

[imported_Jubei]

I can't even get past bios . . . since PC no longer recognizes the hard disks, the system basically now has no OS.

I have already tried the different SATA ports.

 

[Tenet]

Hi Jubei, it seems reasonable that the SATA controller is bad.

There is no perfect answer of what to do now, its up to you. If it were me and I wanted to upgrade my system anyway, this is a great excuse.

But if I wanted to try to save the existing system, I would risk $20 and buy a SATA controller you can plug into a PCI slot. But if it turns out the mobo is bad anyway, the $20 and some time is wasted. One way to make it worthwhile, perhaps, is to get one with an eSATA port so you have something useful you can use on the next system.

Edit: just some afterthoughts. Before you do anything else trying clearing the CMOS. Its possible it became corrupted and can't recognize the drives.

If problem still there, the hard drive mfrs have diagnostic software you can use, but not sure if they would detect a problem with controller. There are diagnostics you can buy that will do this, but that costs money.

 

[imported_Jubei]

This morning I just tried :

1) Using Asus support CD to flash bios
2) reset cmos by taking out battery and moving jumpers

Neither helped the situation. I am now convinced my motherboard SATA controller is fried. Thanks for all the help guys!

Now is it probably time to do abit of research and come back to see if you folks have some comments on the components I would like on new build!

 

[imported_Jubei]

Just got my hands on a SATA-to-IDE connector and plugging the hard disks to the IDE port, the motherboard / bios successfully recognized the hard disks.

The problem now is that the C drive is connected into the secondary IDE port and the mobo still won't load the OS.

I was hoping that it would boot into Windows. Can I tweak bios to get it to boot in Win XP or what can I do?

 

[Tenet]

Yes, you can select in the BIOS which will be the boot drive.

 

[Old Hippie]

Can I tweak bios to get it to boot in Win XP or what can I do?

You should be able to get to the BIOS and tell it to boot from that drive first.

Good Luck!

 

[Scottae]

Id just make sure in the bios your Sata Option is still enabled and in your boot order correctly

 

[Atheus]

I would update the bios, replace the cables, and clean the connections. Then when that didn't work I'd buy a new motherboard.

 

[rasczak]

there's always the sledgehammer method. you can scare the living wits out of the pc into booting up for you