Shenan Stanley said:
Is it recognized at all in the System BIOS?
If not - there's your issue - nothing to do with HP - and more than
likely - not going to work.
More information would be needed to troubleshoot - like the make/model of
the drive and make/model of the motherboard...
Although - to be truthful - if the motherboard is not recognizing the
drive - your problem most certainly is not a Windows XP one.
thfc1882:
I'll get to your specific query in a moment, but before doing so let me make
the following comments...
1. We have run into more than a few problems with these IDE to SATA
connectors in that sometimes they work, sometimes they don't. It's not a
device that we ordinarily recommend. So keep that in mind.
2. Assuming the additional expense could be tolerated by your brother, could
he consider this alternate configuration for his new SATA-capable system?
a. Install your brother's present PATA HDD in a USB external hard drive
enclosure. Then you can use that HDD as a backup HDD using whatever backup
program he presently uses (he does use one, right?). Better still would be
to use a disk imaging program such as Acronis True Image to establish &
maintain a comprehensive backup system.
b. Purchase a SATA HDD (one of the newer SATA II models) and use the disk
imaging program to clone the contents of the PATA HDD (now in its external
enclosure) to the new SATA HDD. Are you aware that it's a virtual certainty
that he will have to perform a Repair installation of XP because of the new
motherboard?
3. If the above has no appeal to you/him and his only interest is to use his
present PATA HDD as an SATA device...
a. Check his motherboard user's guide to see if it's necessary to install
SATA drivers. As Shenan has indicated, it would be helpful to know the
make/model of the new motherboard. But in any event carefully review its
user manual for information re SATA HDD detection.
b. When you say "... the IDE HD already has XP installed so is his boot
drive, but it's not being recognized on startup.", what exactly does this
mean? Are you indicating that the XP system on that HDD is from a previous
system? A different computer?
c. As Shenan has asked - is the drive recognized by the motherboard's BIOS?
What precisely happens when you (he) attempts to boot? Error message(s)? A
black screen? As I've indicated above, are you aware that in all likelihood
a Repair install of XP will be necessary following the installation of a new
motherboard before the system will properly boot? Do you know how to
undertake a Repair install? If you do a Google search on "XP repair
install", you'll be pointed to many of these sites. Here are a few...
http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm#RI
http://www.webtree.ca/windowsxp/repair_xp.htm
http://www.geekstogo.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=138
4. One thing your brother may also want to try in the meantime is to connect
his PATA HDD to an IDE channel and see what happens. I'm assuming it won't
boot because of the need for a Repair install of XP - but let's see what
happens...
5. And I'm assuming in all this that your brother has assembled his new
computer properly. If he inserts his XP installation CD in one of his
optical drives, the system will boot to the CD, right?
Anna
