Do I Need To Worry??

[Uncle Bob]

Started last night. Message in the boot screen. Primary IDE no 80
conductor cable installed. I've tried 2 new cables,same message.
Am I on borrowed time?? Computer seems to be ok. My system;
OS Win 2K Pro. MOBO Via P4MA-533 Hdd Maxtor 120gb CD/ROM
CD/RW-R Zip 750.
Primary IDE is The Hdd and the Zip drive. Zip disconected same message. Jumpers are correct. Drives are recognised in the BIOS
and the boot screen.

[thegladiatorgy]

From what i gather it says that your have a 40 wire cable on the Hard drive instead of an 80 wire one. If that's the case it's no problem to worry about. However u will probably not get the same performance as with an 80 wire one.

Hey Uncle Bob. Believe it or not, I worked on a PC a couple of days ago with the same problem. I tried new cable and HDD . . . turned out to be a bad stick of RAM. ??? Go figure. Try a new stick if you've got it.

[Uncle Bob]

Originally posted by thegladiatorgy
From what i gather it says that your have a 40 wire cable on the Hard drive instead of an 80 wire one. If that's the case it's no problem to worry about. However u will probably not get the same performance as with an 80 wire one.

The primary has an 80 cable.

[Uncle Bob]

Originally posted by EvilRick
Hey Uncle Bob. Believe it or not, I worked on a PC a couple of days ago with the same problem. I tried new cable and HDD . . . turned out to be a bad stick of RAM. ??? Go figure. Try a new stick if you've got it.

I've got two one gb sticks in the board. I sure hope that isn't the
problem. Thanks.

Try just one at a time to see if it goes away.

Oh yeah, the one that was bad was ECC SDRAM if that matters. Is yours registered, buffered, and/or all that good stuff?

[Uncle Bob]

Thanks I will try that. I do have a 128mb stick to test with.
My ram is generic inexpencive (cheepo) PC2100 About 2years old.

Check the BIOS and make sure the ECC is Disabled for it. I'm sure it is since it's been in there for 2 yrs. but it never hurts to check.

[Uncle Bob]

Originally posted by EvilRick
Check the BIOS and make sure the ECC is Disabled for it. I'm sure it is since it's been in there for 2 yrs. but it never hurts to check.

Done all the Trouble shooting you've suggested. Tried some stuff I
came up with. Now the secondary IDE is acting up. I've backed up
every thing on the Hdd. I'm just going to let it rest in peace. Then
salvage the CPU and Ram, then just cut it loose.

[John Prophet]

I was going to say you could pull the stuff off the secondary and put the same 80conductor cable and hard drive there and see if it gives you the same message....or try the 80cable and hard drive on another computer....if it was fine in either of those circumstances then it would probably indicate the primary controller was a bit whacked...(or maybe a bent pin, but prolly not.)

JP