Community Newsletter: Q&A: My second hard drive is doing the peek-a-boo thing
- 9/28/07 3:22 PM
Mistake
by spacepirate1 - 9/30/07 8:23 PM In reply to: Got scammed on eBay? by spacepirate1Can a moderator please delete this post of mine? It doesn't go here. I wanted to submit this for another discussion.
Thanks.
Click on "forum moderators" in the
by Dango517 - 9/30/07 8:31 PM In reply to: Mistake by spacepirate1<<<<<<<Right over there<<<<<. left column. Click on one, most can be e-mailed.
second hard drive
by madan100 - 9/30/07 10:38 PM In reply to: My second hard drive is doing the peek-a-boo thing by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Go to the control panel open administrative tools in computer management
open disk management youe second hard disk will be visible there, right click on it and make it active, restart the conputer.This will solve your problem.
Have fun
Madan Raja Maurya
Unseen Hard Drive
by Santana2 - 9/30/07 11:25 PM In reply to: My second hard drive is doing the peek-a-boo thing by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Your problem is hardware.
If your not familiar with hardware, take the drive to a shop.
They'll put it on a healthy system and run some tests.
Tell the shop you got data on it so they would recover it first.
chances are it'll have to be slow reformated.
I think I had a similar issue
by maximvsv - 10/1/07 12:01 AM In reply to: My second hard drive is doing the peek-a-boo thing by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
It turned out to be a result of having the BIOS go through its Quick Start option when the battery wasn't powering the board well. The Quick Start option bypassed the auto-detect functions, and hardware would only show up properly thereafter if it could be mounted while the computer was in operation, like with a USB device.
Try restarting with the Quick Start option, or its equivalent, disabled.
Some things to check
by svansickle - 10/1/07 7:22 AM In reply to: My second hard drive is doing the peek-a-boo thing by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Here are some things that you can look at to try to resolve your hard drive problem:
The next time the drive comes up "correctly", make sure that it has a volume label: right click on the drive in explorer, click "Properties", then make sure that there is a name at the top next to the drive icon. If there is a name, write it down; if you don't like the name or it's missing, change it to something that means something to you.
Then the next time the drive doesn't come up, see if the drive is visible in the Disk Manager applet (right click on "My Computer", click "Manage", then click "Disk Management" in the tree on the left under "Storage". If the drive comes up there (the volume label is in the leftmost column), some other device is probably "stealing" its drive letter. In that case, usually the solution is to change the drive letter on the "offending" device(s). I usually make my CD/DVD devices "Z:" to help avoid this kind of thing when using removal media or external drives that I turn on and off. You can change the drive letter(s) in the "Disk Management" applet too. The applet will give you an ominous warning about changing the drive letter that you can most likely ignore. The only problems that you can have with this is if you are sharing something from the drive whose letter you are changing; you may have to re-share. Also if you installed any programs from the drive you are changing, Add/Remove programs can get confused if you try to alter or remove the installation. You can change the letter back temporarily if you run into that one.
If the drive doesn't come up, look at the instructions that came with the new drive and make sure that you followed the instructions correctly. You will have to know whether you connected the drive on the same cable as your primary drive or on its own cable and how you set any jumpers or switches; you may have to open the machine to check if you aren't sure. BTW, you can find more information about your specific machine at http://www.e4me.com/support/product_support.html?cat=Desktops&subcat=T-Series&model=T6216
If you don't have printed instructions from the hard drive, you can probably find the information you need on the drive manufacture's web site or on one of the many tech support sites that you'll find through a web search on the drive model info.
It also wouldn't hurt to make sure that your BIOS is updated to the most currently available version. The eMachines web site has a BIOS update from 3/10/06 available (same link as above). It's usually a good idea to get these updates. Check the other available downloads from eMachines too and make sure that all of your drivers are up to date. This may solve a problem that you haven't run into yet.
I hope that this helps.
Scott V
Use Caution With In-Machine Back-Up
by WazmoNariz - 10/1/07 7:17 PM In reply to: My second hard drive is doing the peek-a-boo thing by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Not directly related to the missing E: drive, but you note the second drive is being used for back-up. I used a similar scheme until the disk controller went on the fritz, and corrupted all the data on the second drive. Anything you really want to keep should be backed up to an external USB drive or removable media like DVDs.
--Waz
use caution with in machine back up
by wendysweet - 10/1/07 7:34 PM In reply to: Use Caution With In-Machine Back-Up by WazmoNarizI already mentioned that I use DVD and external Backups.
My hardware experience with similar problem
by bobhinton8st - 10/2/07 4:33 PM In reply to: My second hard drive is doing the peek-a-boo thing by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
I hope this hasn't been covered by someone else, but I don't have time at the moment to read 170+ posts.
1. As I understand it, you added an old hard drive from another computer to your present computer. It was the second drive on your old one and it is the second drive on your present one. You added it as a slave to your existing primary hard drive whose primary partition should normally show up as the C drive, with the operating system on it. The slave drive shows up as E drive. So either you have reassigned drive letters, or you must have a third hard drive as a master on the secondary channel and whose primary partition shows up as D. Because, nless you have reassigned drive letters, the OS defaults to assigning letters to the primary partitions of each master drive first, then to any other partitions of these 2 drives. Then it assigns letters to the slave drives. So we can also conclude your hard drives have only one partition each.
2. If the computer doesn't see a hard drive at boot up, the drive letters will get re-assigned as if it does not exist. If the drive fails after Windows is running, then all the drive letters will be correctly assigned, but the failed drive will be missing from the list in Windows Explorer. You should tell us what letters you see in "My Computer" under both conditions.
For example: My first drive has C and E, F, G, H, I, J, L. The second drive is a secondary master which shows up as drive D and its second partition as M. Then the DVD & CD ROM's, slaves to the 2 hard drives, are O & P. When the power fails to my second drive at boot, I get C and D, E, F, G, H, I, J and the slave DVD ROM is L. The CD ROM that is slave to the second hard drive is not recognized either. If the power to the second drive fails after Windows starts up, then Windows Explorer doesn't show the missing drive letters D, M, & P, but the other partitions still have their normal letters.
3. If you watch the black and white screen as your computer starts, you can see what drives and devices it recognizes. It will also tell you how the drives are accessed. If you press pause at the right moment, you can freeze the boot up so you have more time to read (and write down) the information on the screen. The you can answer questions about ATPI, SATA, etc.
4. If the computer is not seeing the second hard drive sometimes, try to see if it is spinning. If you take off the cover of the computer case, you can either hear the drives spin up when you turn on the power, or you can feel the vibrations by touching the hard drive with your fingers.
In my case, there is some problem with the supply of power to my second hard drive or there may be a crack in the hard drive circuit board. I keep the computer case open all the time. When I start the computer, I watch the black and white screen. If the second drive and CD ROM don't appear, I press the reset button quickly before the Windows XP OS starts and then jiggle the power cable connection until I hear, or feel, the hard drive start to spin up. I keep using the reset button to keep Windows from starting, until the drive is running full speed.
5. If the computer sees the hard drive all the time, but Windows doesn't, but other programs that don't use windows services to access the drives do see the drive, then Windows is the problem, but I don't know how to trouble shoot that
Possible answer to hard drive problem
by knight2448 - 10/2/07 8:38 PM In reply to: My second hard drive is doing the peek-a-boo thing by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
I had something similar happen to my wife's computer. It is a dell but the problem is similar.
Her problem was with the dvd drive.
I just bought a new drive and that fixed the problem. Of course I put the dvd drive on my computer to see if it would work first.
With a hard drive though, First try the jumper settings, and the bios. Be careful in the bios settings you could make it worse.
There is a battery on every computer that stores the system information, I removed mine for about 30 seconds reinserted it and the restarted the computer and it cured my problem with a hard drive I had that was not recognized by my computer.
Then there is also the long process of reinstalling windows which I have also done once. It cured another problem I had.
I would try reinstalling windows after trying the jumper settings first.
I hope this helps
just a suggestion
by ullees - 10/14/07 3:30 PM In reply to: My second hard drive is doing the peek-a-boo thing by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
sometimes hardware parts like that of a harddisk of yours need drivers so that it can be properly installed. but if i may say so that drive is ready to be junk! why trust your data on a malfuntioning drive.
But if you really want that drive check the foll.
1. have you place the pin in the correct position? (ex. slave or master)
2. check the compatabily of the hardware
3. sometimes viruses can coz drives not to appear.
4. the drive is not properly formatted.
check your cable
by gwlogue - 10/25/07 5:06 PM In reply to: My second hard drive is doing the peek-a-boo thing by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
I had a similar "intermittent" problem when moving a drive to another system and installing as a slave. Turned out to be a cable problem. The drive needed 40-pin/80-wire cable. The new system was 40-pin/40-wire. Hope this helps. ...weeG
Hidden hard drive?
by CybersaurusREXX - 10/26/07 9:14 AM In reply to: My second hard drive is doing the peek-a-boo thing by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Hi Wendy,
You said "My problem is...sometimes when I turn the computer on I can see it as the "E" drive and I can access it. Other times I turn the computer on and it ISN'T visible to me so I can't access it."
OK, how are you trying to get to the drive?
Are you using Windows Explorer, clicking on "My Computer" and you get
"Local Disk C" and your CD drive as D but no Icon for E or does E appear as your external drive?
You should also be able to find it by clicking SEARCH, For Files or Folders... You should see:
Look in:
Local Harddrives (C:;E:)
Let us know if the above works or not and someone more knowledgeable than me can provide some answers or more diagnostic questions.
hard drive make pee ca boo
by serolf23 - 11/23/07 3:40 PM In reply to: My second hard drive is doing the peek-a-boo thing by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
first you had to check your jumper setting on your hard drive
if is correct then maybe your are sufferinng of miss hard drive management try to remove a jumper if your cpu board is conventional type
it is automatically on slave setting . while you are test it try to move your ide cable if is insert tightly and then try it in bios setup on standard cmos utility if register in correct management try it maybe i can help you this is ronnie flores of phillippine island
| Forum legend: | |
 |
Locked thread |
 |
Moderator |
 |
CNET staff |
 |
Samsung staff |
 |
Norton Authorized Support team |
 |
AVG staff |
 |
Windows Outreach team |
 |
Dell staff |
 |
Intel staff |
