Hard drive HELP!!!

[rtoz]

OK< I am basically illerate with computers, therefore, I have a friend who is upgrading my computer. He is having problems. Here is the scenario as far as I know it....
My computer is a 6 year old HP Pavilion 8260, I have Windows ME. I have never done anything to upgrade it. Bought a new digital camera and would like to upgrade. Under my friends' guidance I bought the following, a 128mb RAM, a CD burner, and a 40 GB harddrive. The problem is that when he put all this on , the computer is not recognizing the hard drive. Does anybody have any ideas?????

[DPA]

did you use the IDE cable [the fat ribbon like cable] that came with the hard drive? or did you use the old one?

For all that i can gather, the motherboard has a pin or 2 missing from the IDE channel, and you can't use any other hard drives other than COMPAQ *certified* for that model.

it can get really hairy when purchasing new hardware for proprietary machines.

Are you using the 40 gig for space or to install the new os onto?

how does he have it set up?

IDE 1: the old hard drive and then the new hard drive?

if this, does he have the master and slave correct?

or

IDE 2: the cd-rom and the new hard drive together?

same as above does he have master/slave correct?

Please post more information

[stant093]

possibally partition the drive a few times, into smaller chunks, but id say its probably propriety issue...

[DallasDon]

I will assume you mean a second hard drive. Each hard drive must be have the "jumper" correctly connected in the back of it, and the correct connection to the IDE (ribbon) cable.

The main drive is the master, connected to the far (black) end of the ribbon cable, the slave connected to the center connection, and the (blue) end connected to the IDE 1 connection on the mobo. If your original HDD is Western Digital, it may be set to "single", or you do not have the four prong power connector also plugged in to the hard drive.

Same setup for the CD rom, if it is a second drive.

Post more details system specs, and what steps you have taken, for help in trouble shooting.

Do you know how to enter the BIOS setup screen, to see what hardware is recongized, and how it is configured?

[SoltoN]

have him try this:

http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport...ectID=lpv09671

Older HP and Compaq's dont like hard drives over 8 GB. try searching HP's website for a bios flash for your model.

[rtoz]

Well, he figured it out!! I have no idea ho, but he did. he said something about having to download something from the HP website. Thanks for all your help!!!

[sao95]

thread revival: i have a question and it's close to this thread: In general, if you upgrade your hd, but want to keep your old hd operating, is it best to keep old as primary or throw it to secondary? if you advise putting new as primary do you need to transfer os to new hd? if so use a ghost? and if so what ghost program would you recomend? Also what common problems could one encounter?

[Bovon]

If you will continue to use your old hard drive, and the new one will just be for more storage, then the old hard drive will be the same as it is now.. primary master. The new hard drive (once prepaired...fdisked and formatted) will become the primary slave...connected on the same ribbon cable.

Only if you decide to use your new hard drive for the primary one, with an operating system...will you need to ghost (or a new install) of your OS to the new drive.. which will then become your primary master... your old drive can be reformatted and connected as the primary slave for extra storage.

You will need to jumper each drive according to what it will be...and, be aware that different manufacturers have different procedures in the primary/slave jumpering of their drives..so..read up on your drive jumpers.

I don't know anything about ghost..never had to use it.