Hard Drive Problem Please help

[hp2004]

I was wondering if anyone has a sec to tell me what they think about this problem. The hard drive in my old (Pent 1) machine won't spin when it is connected to the motherboard, when I disconnect it, and just have the power connected it spins. How do I know if the motherboard is fried? Please e-mail me with possible solutions or tests! Thanks so much!

[paul9]

pick up an old hd somewhere and test by substitution. btw do you have the ide cable the right way round? red stripe almost always goes next to the power connector, and to pin 1 side on the motherboard.

[whitebeard21]

A weak powers supply could be a problem. A simple test is the smell test with it unpluged smell the ps if it stinks get another one. It should have almost no smell, stink as it goes bad.

[hp2004]

well, thanks for your tips...i have the ide cable plugged in correctly and the power supply smells fine...it is strange that the HD spins when it's not plugged in to the MB..

[Bill in SD, CA]

Can you slave it in another system?

Bill

[Jarhed7276]

Try a different IDE cable.

[hp2004]

well, i just tried a new ide cable, and two different hard drives. I still get the same result; when the ide cable is connected to the hard drive and motherboard, the hard drive will not spin..if i disconnect the ide cable, from the motherboad or HD, it spins..

[Jarhed7276]

hp2004,

Just to be sure we understand, this is an old P1 system and you have not added any new hardware or software. This problem just started out of the blue. Is this correct?

If so I would do as Bill in S.D. suggested and slave the hard drive to another system. If it can be read on another system then you can eliminate for sure the hard drive as the problem.

If the hard drive itself is not the problem then I would look in device manager and see if there are any exclamation marks beside the disk drives or ide ata/atapi controllers.

If there are no exclamation marks in device manager then I would conclude that the ide controller on the motherboard is bad (or something somewhere on the motherboard) and the motherboard needs to be replaced.

[hp2004]

thanks jarhed, i tested the HD in another system as a slave and it worked fine......i also tested another HD in the problem pc and it did not work either. so i think i have figured out it is a bad motherboard...anyways, thanks for the help.

cole

[Jarhed7276]

You are more than welcome.