Primary Hard Disk Drive 0 Not Found

[A Nintendo Fanboy]

I recently found an old Dell Optiplex GX1 lying around, so I tried to
see if I could get it working. But every time it boots, it doesn't
find the hard drive, and just gives me the message "Primary hard disk
drive 0 not found-Press F1 to retry boot, press F2 for setup". I know
it's not the IDE cables, I replaced all of them, and I flashed the
BIOS to make sure nothing nasty was on there. Any ideas as to what's
up?

 

[Ken]

I recently found an old Dell Optiplex GX1 lying around, so I tried to
see if I could get it working. But every time it boots, it doesn't
find the hard drive, and just gives me the message "Primary hard disk
drive 0 not found-Press F1 to retry boot, press F2 for setup". I know
it's not the IDE cables, I replaced all of them, and I flashed the
BIOS to make sure nothing nasty was on there. Any ideas as to what's
up?

Listen to the disk to determine if it is spinning when power is
applied. Report back.

 

[paulmd]

I recently found an old Dell Optiplex GX1 lying around, so I tried to
see if I could get it working. But every time it boots, it doesn't
find the hard drive, and just gives me the message "Primary hard disk
drive 0 not found-Press F1 to retry boot, press F2 for setup". I know
it's not the IDE cables, I replaced all of them, and I flashed the
BIOS to make sure nothing nasty was on there. Any ideas as to what's
up?

Check the jumper settings on your hard drive, to be sure you're not
accidently using Cable Select, or Slave.

Check the BIOS, and make sure that all IDE devices are set to "auto".
On this old Dell, It will probably complain that primary hard drive
1, and secondary hard drive 1 is not found. After you get it sorted,
you can disable the unused IDE devices.

Also: be sure you have a working hard drive, and that it's plugged in
to the primary IDE channel.

 

[GT]

I recently found an old Dell Optiplex GX1 lying around, so I tried to
see if I could get it working. But every time it boots, it doesn't
find the hard drive, and just gives me the message "Primary hard disk
drive 0 not found-Press F1 to retry boot, press F2 for setup". I know
it's not the IDE cables, I replaced all of them, and I flashed the
BIOS to make sure nothing nasty was on there. Any ideas as to what's
up?

Stating the obvious, but it sounds like the hard disk is shot. Take it out
and try it in another PC.