Oh no! I'm breaking the rules!

[Jick]

Hello all!

I am having a little disagreement with my computer and I can't figure out whats up. I have searched many places and have even posted at computer forums but have yet to get a answer that can help me so I decided that I should ask here. Why not? I've tried everywhere else. I think it should be ok to post this here. It's a one time deal and I've tried everything else. Maybe I'll get a better response here since this community is a little friendlier and not too big so my question gets overlooked like on other big computer forums.

I have a Compaq Presario 7360 and it has a standard 10GB hard drive. Now I got this new Deskstar 40GB hard drive because I want to upgrade the hard drive to a bigger one and I'm having a bit of trouble getting it to work. I plug it in and start up the computer and it doesn't recognize it. I hear the drive power up just fine and there is nothing wrong with the cables. I know that because I'm running this 10gig on the same cable right now. I've tried a bunch of different pin configurations and I've tried it with nothing but the 40gig drive plugged in but it still doesn't work. I've looked at the hard drive manufacturers website and it doesn't have anything related to this particular issue. It did however have a download for a diagnostic program which is supposed to find the drive and test it if it's there but it can't find it either. I have already tried detecting it in the BIOS. It's not there. I tried setting it to cable select and it didn't work. I also tried setting it to slave and that didn't work either. I also tried just about every piece of software the manufacturers site had but none of them could detect it either. I don't have any other computer to test this on. Does anybody know whats going on. I hope it's not that this computer can't handle it. I really need more space and this 40gig is all I can do for now.

Here is some info for the 40gig:

Manufacturer: Hitachi
Model Name: Deskstar
Website: http://www.hgst.com/
Capacity: 41.1GB
RPM: 7200RPM
Model #: HDS722540VLAT20
Serial #: C1R521NM
Pin #: 14R9245

Any help you guys can provide will be GREATLY appreciated. :D

[PeOfEo]

You trying to run both at the same time? Or just put the new one in take the old one out?

Try setting the jumped on the old drive to master and put it on the primary ide slot if it is going to be the main one. The set the other to slave. Some motherboards do not like cable select with more then one drive.

If it is one drive try setting it to master and put it in the primary spot, or set it as cable select and put it in the primary spot.

[Jick]

Well my desire is to replace the old one with the new one but at this point I'll do whatever works.

I have already tried setting the pins to master on the new drive and putting it on the primary IDE slot but it still doesn't work. Like I said, I have tried about every configuration I can think of but nothing is working. :(

[PeOfEo]

okay, put the hard drive in another pc, play with it. See if you can see it in the other pc's bios.

[Jick]

Well I currently do not have any other computer to test it in. Also I don't have any other place where I could test it. I don't know anybody around here.

I did talk to a rep at Compaq a while ago and he gave me a link to an update for the BIOS and I installed it but it still doesn't seem to be recognizing it. I do think the BIOS update did something though because before if I had both drives plugged in and both set to cable select it would work fine but now if I have both plugged in and set to cable select it shows the "Cannot find operating system." error on startup. If I unplug the new drive it works again though. I'm so confused. :(

[theuedimaster]

Well you see, newer harddrives have different interfaces. It just may be that your new harddrive has a higher "bandwidth" than your old harddrive and motherboard ports, and therfore won't work. You may need to buy a pci conversion card for your hardrive to work. What type of hardrive do you have? like ata 33? or ata 100? If you want to figure out what type of harddrive your old one is, you might want to try to go to http://www.lavalys.com and download in products, everest home. It will tell you everything possible about your computer. Looking at that, make sure your new harddrive is compatible.

EDIT: Ahh! It seems you have a compaq, i missed that. Compaq's are really bad when you want to update them. They only use their own custom parts usually, you can't replace them with parts off the market. You usually need to special order a part from them. Thats why I don't buy them.....although my first comp was a compaq and it was great!

[PeOfEo]

Compaq, Hp, Dell, they all suck.

[theuedimaster]

This would probably be the first time I have agreed with you PeofEo. Excluding your birthday thread of course.