|
|
|
Only Dos can't see new hard drive.
|
Original Message
|
Name: EstebanUno
Date: January 19, 2004 at 11:14:15 Pacific
Subject: Only Dos can't see new hard drive.
OS: Win XP Home
CPU/Ram: Athlon TBird 1g - 512 ram
|
Comment: After asking this question in the Dos Forum I was told to try this forum. I've got a new Maxtor Fireball 3 hard drive that was a warranty replacement. I want to use it to store backup images and data. Therefore I want to be able to access it from dos in the event of an OS failure. The problem is that this hard drive just does not exist as far as Dos is concerned. Even if it is the only drive in the computer jumpered as master or CS. The odd thing is that Windows XP has no issues with the drive and reports it as a healthy FAT32 partition. The drive is reported on the bios generated startup screen as the correct drive, whether set as master slave or whatever. I've tried WindowsXP, Me, and 98SE generated system diskettes to no avail. If I run fdisk, the error reported is "can't access drive 1." If I try to switch to the drive letter, say c: if it is the only drive in the box, the error is "invalid drive specification." After much trial and error, I put the drive in another computer and booted to DOS using the same boot disk I had just used on the suspect system. Also Athlon cpu, but different motherboard. Bingo, there was the drive, as expected. So I guess I have a motherboard - drive incompatibility, or bios setting problem? The motherboard in question is an ECS k7vta3. But if that is the case, then why is it only in Dos that the drive is invisible? Maxtor support was no help. They washed their hands of the problem once they established it was working correctly in Windows XP. Any ideas? Esteban
Report Offensive Message For Removal
|
|
Response Number 2
|
Name: OtheHill
Date: January 19, 2004 at 12:20:46 Pacific
Subject: Only Dos can't see new hard drive. |
Reply: (edit)When you say Dos can't see this drive, do you mean a boot disk with fdisk on it? Fdisk can't work with disks larger than 64GB. Fdisk + 64 can. How big is that drive? How was the drive originally formatted and partitioned? Which IDE channel is this drive connected to? If connected to secondary channel, are both IDE channels enabled in the BIOS?
 Report Offensive Follow Up For Removal
|
|
Response Number 3
|
Name: hwood
Date: January 19, 2004 at 13:21:06 Pacific
Subject: Only Dos can't see new hard drive.
|
Reply: (edit)Esteban: FAT32 is your problem, if you are using DOS 6.22 or earlier. DOS 6.22 and earlier cannot read FAT32 partitions. They must be formatted FAT16.
Report Offensive Follow Up For Removal
|
|
Response Number 4
|
Name: EstebanUno
Date: January 19, 2004 at 13:21:16 Pacific
Subject: Only Dos can't see new hard drive.
|
Reply: (edit)Yes, I mean a boot disk with Fdisk. The disk is only 40gb. It's not Fdisk + 64. It was originally formatted in WindowsXp under disk management, after being partitioned using Partition Magic as FAT32. Later, after finding out that dos could access the drive in another computer, I started over. Did a low level format, then repartitioned it using fdisk as FAT32, then formatted it using the dos format command from a system diskette in another computer. As stated in my original question, the other computer has no problem seeing the drive in dos, it's only the computer I want to install it in. I'm using the same system diskette in both computers, and the bios shows the drives correctly in the computer where dos cannot access the drive, as far as I can tell. But that computer cannot access the drive in dos even using the same dos startup diskette that I partitioned and formatted the drive with. It sees other drives and cdroms (when present)no problem.
Report Offensive Follow Up For Removal
|
|
Response Number 6
|
Name: EstebanUno
Date: January 19, 2004 at 14:02:56 Pacific
Subject: Only Dos can't see new hard drive.
|
Reply: (edit)Petit Jean - I checked the cable, right type. (Tried another anyway - same symptoms.) Then I downloaded MaxBlast and poked around. The timing is 120ns, same as the Western Digital drive (this drive shows up normally in Dos) that is installed. According to MaxBlast, both drives have the same specs except for these two entries: Ultra DMA Support 0 to 6 on the Maxtor, 0 to 5 on the WD. And ATA# supported 7 to 2 on Maxtor, 5 to 2 on WD. I don't know if that is a clue or not, but these are the only differences on the technical specs reported. MaxBlast is not reporting anything amiss. The only maintenance option is to convert the Bios overlay (ez-bios) to the most recent version. I don't think it is saying the drive has an old version, it's just something that can be done. Other than that I can partition and set up the drive, erasing my previous setup. Is that what you meant by running the tests? I have already run the Powermax tests to check the drive integrity. All was well.
Report Offensive Follow Up For Removal
|
|
Response Number 7
|
Name: EstebanUno
Date: January 27, 2004 at 09:25:48 Pacific
Subject: Only Dos can't see new hard drive.
|
Reply: (edit)Flashing the bios with the latest version fixed the problem. Even though my old version was released only a few months earlier and the there was no mention in the release notes of anything related to the problem.
Report Offensive Follow Up For Removal
|
Use following form to reply to current message:
|
|
|
