BIOS DOES NOT RECOGNIZE HARD DRIVES

[goodmis]

When I boot up, the BIOS does not recognize my hard drives. It recognizes the CDROM and the Floppy. I ran the Dell diagnostic program and it also did not recognize the drives.

How do I diagnose and fix the problem?

All suggestions are appreciated!

Thanks,

Jason

[philipg]

Need more info like Bios type size of hd's. But in general you may need to manualy set the size in the user defined section helps for a faster bootup.

[fishboy]

First make sure the Primary or Master IDE is set to autodetect in the bios. Ensure that the jumper setting on the actual drive is set to the master position. 2nd trace the cabling of the HD and make sure both ends are in the correct position (top end usually has white strip facing up where connection to board usually has strip facing power supply)There might be a notch on the IDE cable that needs to be lined up with the IDE controller as well.

[seti]

Sounds exactly like a jumper problem. If it's not though, you can always enter the values manually.

[Machamix]

hmmm... maybe the drives crashed?
i had an experience like that 2 years ago.

[philipg]

After reading everyone elses reply, I would have to say check to jumper settings make sure if they are on the same cable one is a master and the other is a slave. I have also seen drives with a setting called "Master with XXX" or Master without XXX". I don't remember what the XXX's are but if you have it you will know what I mean. Change to the other setting. Also Make sure the red strip on the drive cable faces the power connector and the other end on the board is in on correctly normaly the red stripe faces towards the back of the machine. but look for pin 1 as this is where the red stripe goes. And last but not least you may have a few other settings in your bios that is preventing the drives from being detected. Also use auto detect in your bios to find the drives. If Everything above is done right auto-detect should see them.