maskotas
asked on
IDE Primary Channel Master Drive Error / Equipment Configuration Error
I own a IBM Thinkpad that is 4 years old. Last March, it suffered a physical hard drive problem (one morning it started making a whirling noise and would not boot) and I had a new hard drive (20 Gb) installed. This morning, while transferring files to a Iomega Zip device, I had a major problem that caused the OS to crash. The laptop rebooted and two BIOS errors appeared: 050. IDE Primary Channel Master Drive Error and 006. Equipment Configuration Error. Now I cannot boot at all. No weird noises to report though.
When I went into the BIOS, it appears as if there is no hard drive (the word "none" appears to the right of the hard drive description). I doubt this is virus-related as I have always run Norton on it.
I can't find my boot diskette. (It was running Windows 2000.) Is there any way to save the information on this laptop? It would seem incredible to loss two hard drives (and most of my information twice) in one year!
Just out of curiousity, I tried restarting with a Microsoft OS CD in the CD drive. I got a message that it could not install the OS because my computer either had no hard drive or the hard drive was not working.
I talked to a PC repair person and was told thsi all means that the controller is "blowing out" drives and that it probably is a better idea to just throw the laptop away.
Any ideas?
William
When I went into the BIOS, it appears as if there is no hard drive (the word "none" appears to the right of the hard drive description). I doubt this is virus-related as I have always run Norton on it.
I can't find my boot diskette. (It was running Windows 2000.) Is there any way to save the information on this laptop? It would seem incredible to loss two hard drives (and most of my information twice) in one year!
Just out of curiousity, I tried restarting with a Microsoft OS CD in the CD drive. I got a message that it could not install the OS because my computer either had no hard drive or the hard drive was not working.
I talked to a PC repair person and was told thsi all means that the controller is "blowing out" drives and that it probably is a better idea to just throw the laptop away.
Any ideas?
William
It may be that the drive has just came loose I would remove the drive and re install it first. most laptops are easy to get to the hard drive.
ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION
membership
This solution is only available to members.
To access this solution, you must be a member of Experts Exchange.
ASKER
Sounds very bad. The only way to get at the data seems to be to take the hard drive out and (1) connect it to the same kind of controller or (2) connect it to a desktop?
Is there any way to know if the controller, hard drive and/or both is the problem? Your solution sounds great but only works if the hard drive is still working.
I am an experienced PC user but would not want to try and get a hard drive out of this laptop again. A techie friend helped me last time---the hard drive is inconveniently located under the keyboard and it is a royal pain to get out! (I am assuming that the laptop to PC data transfer requires taking the laptop apart.)
Thanks for the help!
William
Is there any way to know if the controller, hard drive and/or both is the problem? Your solution sounds great but only works if the hard drive is still working.
I am an experienced PC user but would not want to try and get a hard drive out of this laptop again. A techie friend helped me last time---the hard drive is inconveniently located under the keyboard and it is a royal pain to get out! (I am assuming that the laptop to PC data transfer requires taking the laptop apart.)
Thanks for the help!
William
ASKER
Sounds very bad. The only way to get at the data seems to be to take the hard drive out and (1) connect it to the same kind of controller or (2) connect it to a desktop?
Is there any way to know if the controller, hard drive and/or both is the problem? Your solution sounds great but only works if the hard drive is still working.
I am an experienced PC user but would not want to try and get a hard drive out of this laptop again. A techie friend helped me last time---the hard drive is inconveniently located under the keyboard and it is a royal pain to get out! (I am assuming that the laptop to PC data transfer requires taking the laptop apart.)
Thanks for the help!
William
Is there any way to know if the controller, hard drive and/or both is the problem? Your solution sounds great but only works if the hard drive is still working.
I am an experienced PC user but would not want to try and get a hard drive out of this laptop again. A techie friend helped me last time---the hard drive is inconveniently located under the keyboard and it is a royal pain to get out! (I am assuming that the laptop to PC data transfer requires taking the laptop apart.)
Thanks for the help!
William
The hard drive may indeed be bad. The life expectancy for a HD is *statistically* quite long, but some individuals will inevitably be the first ones to go... Before tossing the laptop, try to get hold of an OK hard drive, any kind that fits inside, and see if it is recognized - then it is not the controller gone bad. Of course, reseating the one that is inaccessible now should be tried first.
I assume you have made sure that the CMOS battery is OK and that it doesn't help to enter hard drive parameters manually.
BTW, did this laptop recognize the 20G hard drive all by itself, or was there an overlay program involved?
Regards
/RID
I assume you have made sure that the CMOS battery is OK and that it doesn't help to enter hard drive parameters manually.
BTW, did this laptop recognize the 20G hard drive all by itself, or was there an overlay program involved?
Regards
/RID
ASKER
RID,
I honestly don't remember how we installed the 20Gb hard drive last March.
How do I make sure that the CMOS battery is OK and that it doesn't help to enter hard drive parameters manually?
William
I honestly don't remember how we installed the 20Gb hard drive last March.
How do I make sure that the CMOS battery is OK and that it doesn't help to enter hard drive parameters manually?
William
CMOS battery usually powers the real-time clock. If date and/or time is way off, the battery may be failing.
The parameters for the hard drive are numbers giving the number of cylinders, the number of heads and the number of sectors per track. These parameters add up to the drive size, if you take into account a sector size of 512 bytes. Some BIOS's can, in addition to automatic detection of hard drive parameters, allow manual entry of these numbers. They are usually found on a label on the HD casing.
If your CMOS battery is indeed bad, your BIOS setup may have fallen back to a "None" entry for primary hard drive, in which case you need to either prompt the BIOS to autodetect the drive, or enter drive parameters after setting primary hard drive to "User defined" (or something like that).
If the BIOS cannot detect and handle a drive that is 20GB (not unusual for older machines), a software is needed to help BIOS handle the drive, sometimes referred to as an "overlay" software. Any mess-up in either boot sector, BIOS settings or overlay software will leave you tearing your hair.
Regards
/RID
The parameters for the hard drive are numbers giving the number of cylinders, the number of heads and the number of sectors per track. These parameters add up to the drive size, if you take into account a sector size of 512 bytes. Some BIOS's can, in addition to automatic detection of hard drive parameters, allow manual entry of these numbers. They are usually found on a label on the HD casing.
If your CMOS battery is indeed bad, your BIOS setup may have fallen back to a "None" entry for primary hard drive, in which case you need to either prompt the BIOS to autodetect the drive, or enter drive parameters after setting primary hard drive to "User defined" (or something like that).
If the BIOS cannot detect and handle a drive that is 20GB (not unusual for older machines), a software is needed to help BIOS handle the drive, sometimes referred to as an "overlay" software. Any mess-up in either boot sector, BIOS settings or overlay software will leave you tearing your hair.
Regards
/RID
ASKER
Thanks to RID too. Both of you provided very useful information.
I am buying a converter. I managed to get to my laptop's hard drive and couldn't get it to work in the laptop. I will put it into my desktop to see if it will work there. I cannot afford the data recovery services so it's $15 for all or nothing!
I am buying a converter. I managed to get to my laptop's hard drive and couldn't get it to work in the laptop. I will put it into my desktop to see if it will work there. I cannot afford the data recovery services so it's $15 for all or nothing!