[DSOTM]

This has been the strangest thing yet to happen on my pc. I left it on for a few hours unattended, but when I came back it was re-loading windows xp. I assumed it had restarted(for unknown reasons) but it never loaded and stayed on the loading screen for at least an hour.

Upon restarting the computer a new message came up that read:
"Scanning IDE drives......" then after a short pause was "No drives attached to fasttrack controller, the BIOS is not installed." This is probally explaining the problem, but im not sure how to fix it.

After this im given the option to start windows normally, in safe mode, safe mode with networking, or last known good configuration. normally and last known configuration dont do anything but bring me back to the continuous loading screen.

Any help would be much appreciated.

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You may not like the answer. Sound like your hard drive may have failed. Do you have another to test?

[admin]

You may not like the answer. Sound like your hard drive may have failed. Do you have another to test?

[DSOTM]

are you serious? while I dont have another hard drive, is there any other way to check? or is the only way to toss it and get a new one.....

[admin]

Check the BIOS and see if any drives are identified. If not, you could try reseating the cables and trying again. If still nothing, then your drive is likely dead.

If the drive does show in BIOS, we'll have to try something else.

[DSOTM]

will do when i get home in a few hours. thanks for trying to help me through this

[DSOTM]

Sorry I've been gone on vacation and sorta left my pc for a while.....

I restarted and the hard disk is recognized as "serial_CHO MASTER maxtor 6Y160M0"

Fastrack 378 BIOS scanned with the result of no drive attached to IDE controller.

I am then sent to safe mode where I can access all my files. Is the hard disk totally dead?....or salvagable? is it possible a cable is unplugged?

I have backed up my files, is there any use in reformatting and re-loading xp?

[Alex_Harris]

I thought the FastTrak 378 controller was for the SATA drives. It might be something as simple as the machine is trying to use the SATA drive to boot off of instead of the IDE hard drive. Just an idea though.