2nd Hard Drive Help

[clthompson]

OK where to start........I have windows XP, and i had an extra disk drive laying around so i decided to put in in my cpu because i hade the room. Now heres the problem..........the device manager says its working properly, but it dont show up on the disk manager. I believe its set to "slave" (how can i be sure?. This is my first time installing a 2nd hard drive. I have been to numerous web sites but they all say to fix it in disk manager. I just need to format it and make the memory available for storage.

[bill]

Welcome to WebmasterWorld clthompson.

I have been to numerous web sites but they all say to fix it in disk manager. I just need to format it and make the memory available for storage.

They're giving you the correct advice if you can see it in Disk Management. ;)

There can be issues with this new disk depending on the way that it was formatted in its previous life. I'm guessing that you have formatted this disk in the past otherwise Windows would pop up a formatting wizard for you immediately after hooking up the new hardware.

There is a very detailed guide to disk management on the MS site: Windows XP Professional Resource Kit: Disk Management [microsoft.com]
You might want to read through there and see whether you can recognize your problem.

If you can see the disk from DOS then booting from a floppy and using FDISK would be one option. Another idea would be to try some partitioning software to see if it can recognize the drive.

[Matt Probert]

I believe its set to "slave" (how can i be sure?.

This is normally set by the jumper on the back of the hard drive. You have three positions: master, slave and cs (cable select). Take the drive out, and check carefully.

Check your BIOS settings. The second drive should be recognised by the BIOS, but may also be disabled in the BIOS, check that also.

Matt

[clthompson]

OK I appreciate the help....I think i found the problem. When i go into "My Computer" and check the properties of my master hard drive, i can go under hardware and the 2nd drive (slave) shows up. Now when i check the properties on it it reads as follows. Disk: Disk 1; Type: Unknown; Status: Unreadable; Partition style: Not Applicable; Capacity, Unallocated space, and reserved space: all 0 MB. Is that because its not formated? or is there something wrong with the dirve? I know it worked when i took it out of another cpu; it was the only drive, Wasnt too long ago.

[Matt Probert]

Again. Check your BIOS (maybe refered to as 'setup' while the computer is booting up). You may need to "autodetect" the drive. Windows will not be able to use a hard drive until the BIOS recognises it.

Matt