Failed Harddrive or something else?

I was about to order a new harddrive since mine has failed. But then I
decided to look inside one more time, and found that there are two
harddrives in there. I never used he second one at all even though it
was always there (i figured it was just one harddrive split in two and
never needed the extra space).

So I decided to switch the harddrive cords since one was hard to get to
and because I have no idea which is the one I was using and which one I
never used.

I used my recovery disks on it and it seemed like everything was going
fine. Then to test it, I shut down the computer then turned it back on 5
minutes later. Then I got stuck on the black screen with blinking "_",
and eventually it says failed to boot disk please insert system disk.

so my questions are:
Did switching the cords make the secondary harddrive the main one, or
did it do nothing?
Does this mean both harddrives have failed?
Are my system files corrupt?
Is there somthing else going on?
Shoul I just take it somewhere to get it looked at


--
Jinxxed0

Jinxxed0 <> wrote:

>
>I was about to order a new harddrive since mine has failed. But then I
>decided to look inside one more time, and found that there are two
>harddrives in there. I never used he second one at all even though it
>was always there (i figured it was just one harddrive split in two and
>never needed the extra space).
>
>So I decided to switch the harddrive cords since one was hard to get to
>and because I have no idea which is the one I was using and which one I
>never used.
>
>I used my recovery disks on it and it seemed like everything was going
>fine. Then to test it, I shut down the computer then turned it back on 5
>minutes later. Then I got stuck on the black screen with blinking "_",
>and eventually it says failed to boot disk please insert system disk.
>
>so my questions are:
>Did switching the cords make the secondary harddrive the main one, or
>did it do nothing?
>Does this mean both harddrives have failed?
>Are my system files corrupt?
>Is there somthing else going on?
>Shoul I just take it somewhere to get it looked at

If they are IDE drives, you need to change the jumpers if they are on
the same channel (two drives, one flat ribbon).

Your new one MUST be the Master - if it is the only one connected,
just remove the jumper (but save it in case you add another). The old
one must be jumpered as Slave.

I think they are SCSI harddrives.
Theres two cords attached to each one a wide one and a small one.
I have no idea what jumpers and channels are exactly. I cant find
anything that says master or slave on it.

At this point should I just take it to someone? I mean, I could
probably do all this stuff, but those terms you used are hard for me to
understand.


--
Jinxxed0

Jinxxed0 <> wrote:

>
>I think they are SCSI harddrives.
>Theres two cords attached to each one a wide one and a small one.
>I have no idea what jumpers and channels are exactly. I cant find
>anything that says master or slave on it.

From the sounds of it, both drives are SATA, so you don't have to
worry about setting any jumpers.

>At this point should I just take it to someone? I mean, I could
>probably do all this stuff, but those terms you used are hard for me to
>understand.

Disconnect the one that you previously had problems with and use your
recovery disc one more time.

alright, thanks for being patient with me. i'll have to try it with each
one (unless i get it right the first time.) so it will be a a while.
again thanks for all the help.

when i looked at the cords i remember seeing SATA on them.


--
Jinxxed0

Okay, I've tried with both harddrives and both did the same thing.
Worked after a recovery, but after shutting down and turning it on, it
just failed to boot the disk.

Do two harddrives normally break/fail when they are in the same
computer? Or is it anoher problem. something did happen with both of the
harddrives though, after he recovery while it was starting up "for he
first time" almost right before it gets to the part where it "prepares
the desktop" i got a blue screen and the computer restarted.

I did a diagnostic test for the harddrives and it keeps saying that
everything passes. Are both of my harddrives failing or is something
else causing this?


--
Jinxxed0

In article <>,
Jinxxed0 <> wrote:
>
>I did a diagnostic test for the harddrives and it keeps saying that
>everything passes. Are both of my harddrives failing or is something
>else causing this?
>

It sounds to me like you just don't have an operating system insatlled
on a bootable drive... Or your bios is set to somehow ignore the hard
drives when it searches for bootable media...

"Jinxxed0" wrote:

>
> Okay, I've tried with both harddrives and both did the same thing.
> Worked after a recovery, but after shutting down and turning it on, it
> just failed to boot the disk.
>
> Do two harddrives normally break/fail when they are in the same
> computer? Or is it anoher problem. something did happen with both of the
> harddrives though, after he recovery while it was starting up "for he
> first time" almost right before it gets to the part where it "prepares
> the desktop" i got a blue screen and the computer restarted.
>
> I did a diagnostic test for the harddrives and it keeps saying that
> everything passes. Are both of my harddrives failing or is something
> else causing this?
>
>
> --
> Jinxxed0
>
If the drives pass the diagnostic tests, they are probably good. Press F8
while booting to bring up the boot menu. If there is an option to "disable
automatic restart on system failure", select that and write down the error
message and post it here. You probably have some other hardware failure. Run
Memtest86 to check the RAM. If the RAM checks okay, disconnect everything
from the mainboard including any devices in PCI slots and USB ports. Attach
only one hard drive and one known good optical drive and try the install
again.