[Webslinger64]

I completed a desktop PC build about two months ago and it has been working flawlessly until this evening. I was online with a few websites opened as usual. Stepped away from my desk for a few minutes and when I came back this is what I saw on the monitor...



I rebooted the PC and accessed the BIOS to look at the Boot order settings. What I found was this...



Somehow my HDD is gone. Boot settings only show my DVD RW drive. So, where the heck did it go and what might have cause it to disappear from the Boot order settings?

As an FYI, I posted recently on GTG about an issue I was having with the new Mobo I purchased for this build. It is an ASRock Fatal1ty Z87 Killer. Apparently, there are two red LED lights on the mobo that have to do with the Main BIOS and Backup BIOS. One of those should be lit to indicate which BIOS is in use. Well, on my mobo neither one of the red LED lights is lit. I contacted ASRock about this and just received an e-mail from them today stating they would like to RMA the mobo. So, now I'm wondering if that issue could be responsible for the HDD not showing up in BIOS.

I will get the RMA taken care of so I can return the mobo. But might this really be the reason the HDD has vanished from BIOS? Are there other troubleshooting steps I can take to know for sure why this has happened?

Other than the red LED BIOS light not being lit, this mobo has performed flawlessly that past two months.

Edited by Webslinger64, 04 February 2014 - 10:44 PM.

[Advertisements]

Hard drive failures can and do happen. It's possible that the motherboard is not picking it up for some reason (try a different port on the motherboard), or the PSU is not powering it up correctly, or the SATA cable needs replacing... so confirm all those before writing the drive off.

[Troy]

Hard drive failures can and do happen. It's possible that the motherboard is not picking it up for some reason (try a different port on the motherboard), or the PSU is not powering it up correctly, or the SATA cable needs replacing... so confirm all those before writing the drive off.

[iammykyl]

Gday.
Bit more.
Sounds like the system rebooted and the HDD was not detected, hence the message.
Could be, HDD failed, reboot. MB fault, reboot,
I would not use the system to try and diagnose/repair the HDD. RMA the MB.

You could connect the HDD in another system or use an external encloser, download Set Tools or WD lifeGuard and run on the HDD.

[Webslinger64]

Hard drive failures can and do happen. It's possible that the motherboard is not picking it up for some reason (try a different port on the motherboard), or the PSU is not powering it up correctly, or the SATA cable needs replacing... so confirm all those before writing the drive off.

Checked PSU and SATA cable connections. Everything seems fine. I did switch SATA cables and ports to make sure. Power cable from PSU to this HDD also powers DVD-RW drive (which is working), so I believe PSU connection is ok.

Gday.
Bit more.
Sounds like the system rebooted and the HDD was not detected, hence the message.
Could be, HDD failed, reboot. MB fault, reboot,
I would not use the system to try and diagnose/repair the HDD. RMA the MB.

You could connect the HDD in another system or use an external encloser, download Set Tools or WD lifeGuard and run on the HDD.

I've installed the HDD from the non-working PC (HDD-1) into a PC that already has it's own HDD (HDD-2) with Windows 7 OS on it. My question now is, before I boot up the PC, will adding HDD-1 cause any boot up problems (HDD-1 also has Windows 7 OS installed on it, so there are now 2 HDDs with Windows 7 OS and both HDDs are installed on the same PC), or will the PC boot up to it's own HDD as normal? Once it does boot up, do I need to do anything to get the PC to recognize the additional HDD (HDD-1)? Once booted up, I should be able to got to 'start', 'computer', and see both HDDs (if they are both properly working). If HDD-1 is bad, it won't show up right?

[iammykyl]

Gday.
Start the computer and enter the BIOS.
Check that HDD 2 is set as the 1st HDD to boot, > save settings, > exit.
On boot, the correct OS will be used.

Once booted up, I should be able to got to 'start', 'computer', and see both HDDs

Yes. Download recuva, > http://www.piriform.com/recuva Back up your files,
You can Then use the HDD tool you downloaded to attempt a repair. Do not boot to the faulty drive while in the good computer.
You must return it to the original computer and then test.

[Webslinger64]

Gday.
Start the computer and enter the BIOS.
Check that HDD 2 is set as the 1st HDD to boot, > save settings, > exit.
On boot, the correct OS will be used.

Once booted up, I should be able to got to 'start', 'computer', and see both HDDs

Yes. Download recuva, > http://www.piriform.com/recuva Back up your files,
You can Then use the HDD tool you downloaded to attempt a repair. Do not boot to the faulty drive while in the good computer.
You must return it to the original computer and then test.

Alright, connected faulty HDD to PC with working HDD, went into BIOS, Boot Order and found that the faulty HDD was not recognized.
So, to clarify, are saying connect the faulty HDD to the PC, then boot up the PC with the working HDD, then download Recuva to the working HDD and use the program to attempt a repair of the faulty HDD? Does Recuva somehow find the faulty HDD even when it's not recognized by the BIOS so it can attempt a repair?
Also, I forgot to mention that when this problem first started, I was using the PC and everything was fine. Went out of the room for a few minutes, came back and found the "reboot and select proper boot device" displayed on the monitor. I also noticed there was a ticking sound coming from inside the PC case. Not sure what that might have been, but I had never heard it before this problem arose.

Edited by Webslinger64, 07 February 2014 - 11:58 AM.

[iammykyl]

Gday.

I also noticed there was a ticking sound coming from inside the PC case. Not sure what that might have been, but I had never heard it before this problem arose.

Well, that could mean a mechanical failure, also, drive not seen in the BIOS, probable means Recuva will not see it.


Before proceeding please try the following and report back.


Is the faulty drive seen in Disk management or Windows Explorer?
Try a different SATA port for the faulty HDD. > restart the computer, > enter BIOS, is the faulty drive detected?

[Webslinger64]

Gday.

I also noticed there was a ticking sound coming from inside the PC case. Not sure what that might have been, but I had never heard it before this problem arose.

Well, that could mean a mechanical failure, also, drive not seen in the BIOS, probable means Recuva will not see it.


Before proceeding please try the following and report back.


Is the faulty drive seen in Disk management or Windows Explorer?
Try a different SATA port for the faulty HDD. > restart the computer, > enter BIOS, is the faulty drive detected?

Sorry for the delay in responding. I Checked Disk Management, Windows Explorer and BIOS. Faulty drive was not seen nor detected in those options.

[iammykyl]

Gday.
If you can feel or hear that the drive is working, it is worth trying Recuva Portable, Save to the desktop, You will need a USB stick, connected, unzip to the USB stick, click to run the wizard.
> http://www.piriform.com/recuva/builds

[Troy]

If the drive is not seen or detected, you're not going to have any luck recovering data from it. The only option would be a professional data recovery service if you need the data back and don't have any backups.

Otherwise just RMA the drive and move on.

(I personally had this happen to me many, many years ago now, before I started working in IT. I didn't have backups and I lost years of pictures and documents. I kept the drive and saved up until I could afford the data recovery price, but even then the drive had been damaged enough that data was unrecoverable)

[Webslinger64]

If the drive is not seen or detected, you're not going to have any luck recovering data from it. The only option would be a professional data recovery service if you need the data back and don't have any backups.

Otherwise just RMA the drive and move on.

(I personally had this happen to me many, many years ago now, before I started working in IT. I didn't have backups and I lost years of pictures and documents. I kept the drive and saved up until I could afford the data recovery price, but even then the drive had been damaged enough that data was unrecoverable)

Thanks for the reply and I apologize for the slow response. I did RMA the HDD and received the replacement today. As I was going through the process of installing Windows 7 Professional 64-bit OS, it's telling me the following, "Windows cannot be installed to this disk".
I'm not sure why that is as I didn't have that problem with the first HDD I installed the OS too. Obviously the HDD is there and recognized by the OS installation, it's just telling me it won't be able to install the OS to my HDD. Any idea why that might be?

Thank you.

[iammykyl]

Gday.
Make sure you only have the HDD connected where you are installing the OS.
Restart > enter BIOS, > set HDD controller to AHCI, > set boot order to, OD first, HDD, second.
Place the installation cd in the drive, do not close,
Restart the computer.

[Troy]

Does this help?

http://answers.micro...40-1e0db62af309

[Webslinger64]

Gday.
Make sure you only have the HDD connected where you are installing the OS.
Restart > enter BIOS, > set HDD controller to AHCI, > set boot order to, OD first, HDD, second.
Place the installation cd in the drive, do not close,
Restart the computer.

Does this help?

http://answers.micro...40-1e0db62af309

Turns out the SATA cable I used to connect the RMA HDD was bad. Connected a different SATA cable to it and the OS did install. That same SATA cable was good just recently, so don't know how that happens, but we're up and running. Thank you for your help!

[iammykyl]

Thanks for keeping us updated and pleased you solved the problem.

Your welcome.