Vanished second hard drive

[Guest]

Hello,
My computer has been working fine - XP Home with SP2.
when I booted this morning, the mouse wouldn't work properly and QuickLaunch
had vanished.
I have got these items working again but my second internal hard drive where
all my documents and pictures are stored has vanished.
System Restore will not work.
I have checked Disk Management and there is no sign of the second drive. It
does not show up in the BIOS either.
Desperately hoping someone can help.
Thanks
John

 

[Bob Harris]

When a disk does not show up in the BIOS checks, you probably have a
hardware problem.

This could be as simple as a loose power or signal cable. Or, it could be a
bad cable, bad hard drive controller (i.e., bad motherboard), or bad hard
drive.

Power off and check the cables. Then, power on.

If that does not help, try attaching the hard drive to a different
controller and/or cable, if your PC has more than one.

If none of that helps, try mounting the disk inside of a different PC, or in
a USB 2.0 enclosure.

If no PC can see the hard drive, then the drive is likely bad.

If there are irreplaceable files on the hard drive, be aware that there are
services that can sometimes rescue data from dead drives, by mounting their
magnetic platters of in another drive. But, these services are not cheap.

Scenerios like this are why backups are important.

 

[Rock]

Hello,
My computer has been working fine - XP Home with SP2.
when I booted this morning, the mouse wouldn't work properly and
QuickLaunch
had vanished.
I have got these items working again but my second internal hard drive
where
all my documents and pictures are stored has vanished.
System Restore will not work.
I have checked Disk Management and there is no sign of the second drive.
It
does not show up in the BIOS either.
Desperately hoping someone can help.

If a drive doesn't show up in the BIOS, it's a hardware issue, not an XP OS
issue. Either the hard drive failed, or the cabling failed or there's a
problem with the motherboard. Install the drive in another computer and
see. Is there not a backup of the important data? This should be a given
at all times.

 

[Nobody]

If it does not show up in the BIOS, then the drive is suspect.
You might try changing it to Master, just to see if it works. Maybe the Second IDE is failing?
Either that, or maybe the cable is just not seated correctly?
Maybe the power to the drive is not seated or not correct?

If the drive has crashed or failed, don't mess with it.
Look for Software Recovery tools, they are cheaper than taking it in to be serviced.

HTH,

 

[Guest]

If it does not show up in the BIOS, then the drive is suspect.
You might try changing it to Master, just to see if it works. Maybe the Second IDE is failing?
Either that, or maybe the cable is just not seated correctly?
Maybe the power to the drive is not seated or not correct?

If the drive has crashed or failed, don't mess with it.
Look for Software Recovery tools, they are cheaper than taking it in to be serviced.

HTH,

Thank you very much for your replies everybody. They are very much
appreciated.
Fortunately, I had just completed a back up to an external drive which I
hope matched the lost D drive but I would much rather have the D drive back
as I know that has everything on it.
The strange thing is that it showed no signs of being temperamental.
Yesterday everything was working completely as normal.
I will try your suggestions . I do not have access to another computer to
try things on but I will check the cables and so on and I do have a USB
enclosure.
It doesn't look hopeful though from what you say.
I will let you know how I get on and would definitely appreciate any further
comments.
John

 

[Guest]

Thank you very much for your replies everybody. They are very much
appreciated.
Fortunately, I had just completed a back up to an external drive which I
hope matched the lost D drive but I would much rather have the D drive back
as I know that has everything on it.
The strange thing is that it showed no signs of being temperamental.
Yesterday everything was working completely as normal.
I will try your suggestions . I do not have access to another computer to
try things on but I will check the cables and so on and I do have a USB
enclosure.
It doesn't look hopeful though from what you say.
I will let you know how I get on and would definitely appreciate any further
comments.
John

I have now checked the BIOS again and I think that in fact both drives are
listed. Under peripherals it shows serial sata disk 1 and serial sata disk 2,
both enabled.
Maybe I missed that the first time.
I am sorry to have mislead you and if that is the case wonder if it changes
your advice.
John

 

[mikeyhsd]

you might download the diagnostics from the drive maker web site and run them against the drive to see if there is a problem.



(e-mail address removed)

Thank you very much for your replies everybody. They are very much
appreciated.
Fortunately, I had just completed a back up to an external drive which I
hope matched the lost D drive but I would much rather have the D drive back
as I know that has everything on it.
The strange thing is that it showed no signs of being temperamental.
Yesterday everything was working completely as normal.
I will try your suggestions . I do not have access to another computer to
try things on but I will check the cables and so on and I do have a USB
enclosure.
It doesn't look hopeful though from what you say.
I will let you know how I get on and would definitely appreciate any further
comments.
John

I have now checked the BIOS again and I think that in fact both drives are
listed. Under peripherals it shows serial sata disk 1 and serial sata disk 2,
both enabled.
Maybe I missed that the first time.
I am sorry to have mislead you and if that is the case wonder if it changes
your advice.
John

 

[Guest]

you might download the diagnostics from the drive maker web site and run them against the drive to see if there is a problem.



(e-mail address removed)

Thank you mikey. I may well do that.

A very strange thing happened this morning after the computer had been
switched off all night.

When I booted up, the D drive was back in all its glory! - yippee!

I cannot understand it. I had tried rebooting several time yesterday but the
drive did not reappear and yet this morning, the computer having been off for
a few hours overnight, there it is.

I am of course completely delighted but I would like to know how and why it
happened and perhaps be able to prevent it from happening again.

All thoughts on this would be much appreciated.

Thanks you very much everybody for your kind help.

John

 

[mikeyhsd]

possible just letting it run down and COOL off.
would still run the diagnostics to be safe.
they are not 100% positive, but its a start.

do you regularly run a temp fan monitor program.
I use Speed Fan. monitors temp, fan speeds and also SMART status if available.



(e-mail address removed)

you might download the diagnostics from the drive maker web site and run them against the drive to see if there is a problem.



(e-mail address removed)

Thank you mikey. I may well do that.

A very strange thing happened this morning after the computer had been
switched off all night.

When I booted up, the D drive was back in all its glory! - yippee!

I cannot understand it. I had tried rebooting several time yesterday but the
drive did not reappear and yet this morning, the computer having been off for
a few hours overnight, there it is.

I am of course completely delighted but I would like to know how and why it
happened and perhaps be able to prevent it from happening again.

All thoughts on this would be much appreciated.

Thanks you very much everybody for your kind help.

John

 

[Guest]

possible just letting it run down and COOL off.
would still run the diagnostics to be safe.
they are not 100% positive, but its a start.

do you regularly run a temp fan monitor program.
I use Speed Fan. monitors temp, fan speeds and also SMART status if available.



(e-mail address removed)

Thank you mikey,

I will look for the diagnostic and have a go with it.

I do not have any temp fan monitor program. I have looked up SpeedFan and
will download it and try it. I don't know about SMART status but will
investigate. I certainly don't want this to happen again.

It never occurred to me that temperature might be the problem.

Your help is very much appreciated.

John

 

[mikeyhsd]

hope you get it worked out.

SMART is a monitoring built into the hard drives to give advise of expected failure.
there are numerous programs that can read the data, Speed Fan is just one of them, to see the info you need to have SMART enabled in the bios.




(e-mail address removed)

possible just letting it run down and COOL off.
would still run the diagnostics to be safe.
they are not 100% positive, but its a start.

do you regularly run a temp fan monitor program.
I use Speed Fan. monitors temp, fan speeds and also SMART status if available.



(e-mail address removed)

Thank you mikey,

I will look for the diagnostic and have a go with it.

I do not have any temp fan monitor program. I have looked up SpeedFan and
will download it and try it. I don't know about SMART status but will
investigate. I certainly don't want this to happen again.

It never occurred to me that temperature might be the problem.

Your help is very much appreciated.

John

 

[Guest]

hope you get it worked out.

SMART is a monitoring built into the hard drives to give advise of expected failure.
there are numerous programs that can read the data, Speed Fan is just one of them, to see the info you need to have SMART enabled in the bios.




(e-mail address removed)

Hi mikey,

I have now enabled SMART in the BIOS and installed SpeedFan.

I have downloaded the Seagate diagnostic tool and run that. Happily, it
gave a pass in both the short and the long modes.

So, I shall now keep an eye on the temperatures. The icon for SpeedFan is
sitting in my system tray and currently reads 25 temp 1, 30 temp 2 and 70
temp 3.

I have to say that I don't really understand the SpeedFan readings or the
SMART ones in it but if the temperatures go up dramatically, I shall close
down.

Thanks again for all your very much appreciated help.

John