Question

cant see the hard drive while installing xp pro

Asked by: greeneel

i am trying to install a new hard drive in a DELL dimension 3100 desktop.

1. the hard drive is a western digital Caviar SE 250GB
2. i am installing xp pro SP2
3. the drivers i got from western digital to be installed after pressing F6 at the start of xp's installation process did not work(these are the ones you use a floppy to install).

now whenever i try to use these hard drive drivers or do without them i get the notification from the xp installation that no hard drive was found.
i check the data cable and the power cable. i am a bit stumped now please advise

thanks for your time

GE

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Asked On
2009-10-20 at 08:35:53ID24827308
Topics

Windows XP Operating System

,

Hard Drives & Storage

,

Personal Computers

Participating Experts
3
Points
500
Comments
6

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Answers

 

by: gecko_au2003Posted on 2009-10-20 at 08:40:57ID: 25615290

In the bios you need to ensure that the relevant sata ports are enabled / turned on in the bios as dell by default only have there own sata port 0 or 1 enabled so if you enable the other ones / ports for sata

If its when booting then you can use nlite to slipstream the sata drivers ( downloadable from dells website ) with the xp disc you have

http://www.nliteos.com/

Let me know how you get on

Also in the bios there may be an option to disable / enable AHCI ( worth trying ) and also another setting to swap between SATA or IDE mode with reference to RAID or how the drive operates, I think dell have a similiar setting where you can have it as suggested, performance or backward compatable option as well, so if you try the backward compatable option as well.

 

by: EirmanPosted on 2009-10-20 at 08:42:23ID: 25615304

Can you see it in the bios setup at startup (usually accessable by pressing delete during startup)

Are you using master slave setup or cable select on the new drive ?

 

by: greeneelPosted on 2009-10-20 at 08:49:36ID: 31643443

Thanks for all your help sir!!
have a nice day

with great respect and thanks

GE

 

by: leewPosted on 2009-10-20 at 08:53:14ID: 25615422

Western Digital does not provide the drivers that you need during setup - you're not using HARD DISK DRIVERS, you're using DISK CONTROLLER drivers.

I BELIEVE these are the drivers you need:
http://support.dell.com/support/downloads/download.aspx?c=us&l=en&s=gen&releaseid=R130118&SystemID=DIM_PNT_P4_3100&servicetag=&os=WW1&osl=en&deviceid=8615&devlib=0&typecnt=0&vercnt=2&catid=-1&impid=-1&formatcnt=1&libid=41&typeid=-1&dateid=-1&formatid=-1&fileid=173456
(You'll need to manually put them on a floppy or use nlite to incorporate them into a new CD).

 

by: gecko_au2003Posted on 2009-10-20 at 10:23:35ID: 25616370

no problem glad you got the issue sorted - just out of curiosity what did you do to resolve it as a few things were suggested - also leew and Eirman made suggestions so not sure if those helped ?

 

by: greeneelPosted on 2009-10-20 at 10:35:09ID: 25616481

the hard drive that was inside it was a Hitachi sata drive but the bios was not set for sata. so even thou it was plugged into sata port 1 that port was not enabled for sata use and  i thought it would be because that's what the old drive was using! so basically your first line was the fix..  the port was not enabled for sata use simple but effective(stupid me)!1

thx again for your time

20120131-EE-VQP-002

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