I purchased a 20GB hard drive to back up my data and I purchased a PCI IDE Controller Card and installed it in an open PCI slot. Along with my purchase I received and installed the IDE ribbon between the card and the drive. I also received a small CD and was told it was for installing the proper drivers so my computer would recognize the new drive.
My problem is that there are lots of files on the small CD and I don't know what to look for. Can someone help?

Thanks,

Richard

After you install the card the drive and connect power and data cables to the drive, reboot the computer. Windows should find new hardware at the restart. When it starts installing the hardware you will be able to instruct Windows to search for the correct drivers. Provide the correct path to the CD by using the browse button. If you don't see a next button highlight, dig further into the path of the CD until the next button is highlighted. What you will be looking for is, first the correct model of the card. Many times the same CD is used for multiple models. Then WinXP, if that is the OS you run. Then is necessary, you may need to click further to an .inf file. Hope I haven't made this confusing.

If none of the above seems to work you can look for a file called setup.exe and doubleclick it.

OtheHill is right. However, many times, you won't even need to install the drivers. The new hard drive should be detected and installed automatically, and I've seen many times where the IDE controller card will be detected and installed automatically too.

-Ryan Adams
http://RyanTAdams.com

You may have to go in BIOS and set Plug And Play OS to No. Some controllers need the BIOS to initialize them before windows can see them.

I'm just a shadow of my former self!

Dark666

I don't think the OP intends to boot from that drive.

Neither did I.
E.G. I have one SCSI card that if I have PNP OS YES in BIOS the card is not seen by the OS and I can't access the drives.
Like I said some cards need BIOS to initialize them in order to use the drives, not necessarily to boot.

I'm just a shadow of my former self!

I think I see the PCI IDE card I installed, but I don't see the new hard drive. I went to Device Manager and see an entry titled IDE ATA/ATAPI Controllers and under that folder I see three entries:
1. Intel 82801FB Ultra ATA Storage Controllers - 2651
2. Primary IDE Channel
3. Secondary IDE Channel

I selected the first item and the device status said that the device was working properly.

When I open the Disk Drives folder on Device Manager there is only one entry for Maxtor 6Y160M0. Should I expect to see the 20GB backup drive listed there also?

Other information: I have the drive on the end connector of the ribbon cable, so the middle connector is not connected to anything? Is that OK? I have the power connected to the drive and the jumper set to Master? Can I have two Masters (the 160 HD is on a SATA cable and then my backup on the IDE ribbon)? Does the PCI card need power going to it somehow?

Thanks for your help and suggestions.

Thanks,

Richard

Perhaps the drive has not been assigned a drive letter. Right-click "My Computer" and select Manage. Inthe screen that appears go to Storage/Disk Management. If you see the drive listed you should have an option to assign a drive letter.

Michael J

Michael J has a good point, the drive may also need to be formated. This can be done in the same place Michael J is talking about.

-Ryan Adams
http://RyanTAdams.com

I was able to see my new drive and even add a couple of files there when I connected a IDE ribbon directly from the mother board to the new drive. I had to disconnect the ribbon from my two DVD drives to do it, but I wanted to rule out something being wrong with the drive.

I also used the new ribbon that came with the PCI card and did the same thing with the same results. So there is nothing wrong with either of the ribbon cables.

However, I cannot see all of my hardware at the same time. I always see my C drive, but I either see my backup drive or I see the DVD drives. I have yet to see all of them at one time under My Computer.

So it doesn't look like I need to format the drive or run set-up from the mini disk that came with the PCI card. I conclude this because I can get to the drive and use it, but not by going through the PCI card. I only get to use it when going directly from the mother board.

Is it possible that my computer can't handle this extra drive? Is there some setting somewhere that I need to check?

I hit F2 while logging on to get to the set up screens. I saw something under System Information about a floppy drive, 2 SATA drives and 2 IDE ATA drives (or something like that). One of the SATA drives was labled "not enabled" and the same thing for one of the IDE ATA drives. There was no information on how to enable these drives. I also didn't find anything to do with Plug and Play. Where would I find that?

I'm getting to the point where I'll probably have to hire someone to fix all this, but I appreciate your continued suggestions if you have any.

Thanks,

Richard

First of all I have looked at the manual for your MBoard. You probably should hae bought another SATA harddrive instead of the 20GB drive you bought.

Lets recap. To me it appears you have two optical drives and one harddrive. It also appears you have only one IDE controller. What you need to do is to connect the optical drives to the onbaord IDE connector and the second harddrive to the controller card. Your computer should boot normally at this time.

Now go to Disk Managment. Right click My Computer> manage> storage> disk management. The new 20GB should appear there. If so, post back what all the information reated to that drive states. Below is a link to what I believe is your MBoard.

http://support.dell.com/support/edo...

I appreciate everyone's help. I ended up exchaning the 20GB HD & PCI IDE Card with an 80GB HD that had a SATA connection. I still couldn't see the new 80GB HD in Disk Manager or elsewhere, so I took the computer to a repair shop. They couldn't figure out what happened either, so they just restored my system back a couple of weeks. Now I can see the new drive and everything works!

Again, I appreciate everyone's contributions and willingness to help. This was just one of those cases where something got out of whack.

Thanks,

Richard