Windows Server 2008 installation unable to detect hard drives

Is this a brand new Server?  Normally it is hardware config issue, and possibly 08R2 doesnt recognize the drive controller, but I would imagine it would handle just about any raid or sas or scsi controller out there.  Could always get the actual driver for the controller and at the prompt for hardware drivers point to it.

As Hutch said, you may just need to manually add the drivers.

I'd also check the hard drive configuration and if they are on a raid controller make sure its been configured and a logical volume has been created.

At the beginning of the boot for install at the bottom you will see "press F6 to add additional drivers" or something similar.
Press F6 then a little later it will give you the option of adding drivers.
I use an external floppy for the drivers.
You will need to get what I call DOS drivers for your controller. They will fit on a floppy.
then add the correct driver at this point and the setup will find your hard drives.

You will know the corrcet driver type when you see "TXTSETUP.OEM" is the name of one of the files.

its not a new server i have two 500 GB drives one is seagate ST3500630AS it appears in bios but it doesnt appear when i try to install the window if someone knows how to get the driver for this model that would be great

How is the server configured?are you using raid or are they just straight SATA connections?
Cant help you find the driver with out a whole lot more information about the server.

You don't need the driver for the hard drive, you'd need the driver for the hard drive controller.  This will often be displayed on boot.

how do i get that or do that

to start the model IBM server helps.  The original Config paperwork would help as well as it would have a card Looking for a SAS/SATA/Raid/SCSI information on the config.  

Or like was said on boot it will offer you a place to configure raid and will give the raid controller information and you may need to hit CntrlS at this point or what it happens to say and make sure you actually have a drive configured in raid 1 that is usable.

As Hutch said, model of the server would help.  You can also open up the case and see if the model of the controller card is on the server.  Or when the server boots and displays the drives, see if it displays the model of the raid card there as well.

How old is this server?  If its really old, you may have a hard time finding a driver that works with 2008.

While the server is booting it will initialize the contrlooers and show on the monitor in a DOS looking format.
If you press pause on the keyboard it will pause the boot cycle giving you time to write down the controller(s).
After you hit pause hit enter to continue and then pause again if needed.

As Hutch_77 stated you are looking for RAID or hard drive controllers SAS/SATA/Raid/SCSI.
Report back what you find.

i dont think there is any raid controller

What is the model info for the IBM server. There is almost always a Raid controller it just might be an embedded contropper

1.00 IBM 326 Dual 2.4Ghz AMD 64-Bit 1U SCSI Server 4GB RAM 130.00130.0020.0026.00
Full Rack Rail Kit
2 x 500GB SATA HDD

From: http://www-947.ibm.com/support/entry/portal/docdisplay?lndocid=MIGR-57430

Solution  

Download drivers (v1105) from http://www.siimage.com and press F6 at beginning of text setup mode to install drivers for the SATA controllers.

Additional information  

The drivers for the SATA (Sii 3512) controller are not in the operating system.

On the front of the server you should have a little sticker that has a model number in the format xxxx-xxx and below it is the serial number. If you can give us that model number we can point you in the right direction.

I will get you that as soon I get to office

MT-M
8848-CTO

thats the IBM details i see i went to the website you mentioned  http://www.siimage.com dont know how to obtain the driver

it said 326 on it as you guys have sent the link for it

hi
i dont see this listed on the download page can someone point me to the right object on this page
http://www.siliconimage.com/support/searchresults.aspx?pid=32&cat=3

hi
do i need to extract iso files before burning to the disk?

On that page less than 25% of the way down is  "* SiI 3132 64-bit Windows BASE Driver" that is the 64 bit F6 driver for the 3132.

Depeneds if you have a program like nero or Roxio to burn discs installed on your computer most of those will take the iso file and burn it properly to a cd.

will the free software able to handle iso?

what are you trying to use?

http://www.nero.com/eng/downloads-nbl-free.php

hi
i dont see on the page ibm 326  series do you think this will work ok on the 326 as this is the series of my server.?

The nero free verison should work if not give this a try http://www.freeisoburner.com

i have one issue i dont have any CDs but I do have DVD as I saw on IBM site that it must be burn using CDs

Well you could give it a try but I can't say it will still work for sure. I have always burned to cds when needing an updated copy of this package.

Hi
Floppy is not available what is the other way I can load the driver can I not run external usb I get the oppurtunity during windows installation process to seleect the driver I have downloaded one previously however which I think I have sent a link it doesn't install the hard drive

You will need to get an external floppy or burn the ISO to a CD.

I mostly use the external floppy method but mrhamen sounds confident that the ISO will also peform the needed function.

Those are the only methods I know of to install a driver at the very begining of the setup.

USB drive works just the same, external HDD or thumb drive.

hi
i burned on CD ran the wizard but it said that it doesnt support this version of the server

You burned what on CD? The serverguide or the drivers?

after download the driver has shown the hard drive i installed the driver during windows installation process thanks guys