New HDD problems please help

JamesTuc

JamesTuc

JamesTuc

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Joined
10 Jun 2010
Posts
342
Location
Coventry
I'm building a computer for a friend and have put the following together:

£85.10 x 1 - XFX ATI Radeon HD 5750 XXX 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card
£76.59 x 1 - OCZ Gold 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-10666C9 (1333MHz) Low-Voltage Dual Channel (OCZ3G1333LV4GK)
£70.63 x 1 - Asus M4A88TD-M EVOUSB3 AMD 880G (Socket AM3) DDR3 microATX Motherboard
£41.69 x 1 - AMD Athlon II X2 Dual Core 245 2.90GHz (Socket AM3) - Retail
£34.03 x 1 - Samsung SpinPoint F3 500GB SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM (HD502HJ)
£31.48 x 1 - Corsair CX 400W ATX Power Supply (CMPSU-400CXUK)
£22.97 x 1 - Asus TA-D21 Midi Tower Case - Black
£11.91 x 1 - Samsung SH-S223CBEBE 22x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM


The first time I tried to boot to install Windows I heard a very loud clicking from the HDD. Individual clicks every second or so. The HDD wasn't recognised by the machine so I tried it in mine. I initialised it and formatted it creating a single partition. The drive appeared to be working normally and I copied a 2.5GB folder fine.

I then switched the HDD back into my friend's new pc and installed Windows no problem. I then installed some utilities and other useful programs and restarted the pc. I got the clicking again and the HDD was not recognised.

Has anyone else had similar problems? Or is there something obviously wrong with the build?

I'd really appreciate any help.

Thanks

PS: I also tried using my HDD in my friend's pc, this booted without any issues into my OS.
 
I've formatted the memory stick and all that is on there is F3.exe

When I boot to the usb stick all I get is:

Remove disks or other media.
Press any key to restart
_
 
is the memory stick in a usb3.0 slot? mine wouldnt boot from a usb3.0 slot i had to use one of the other ones that wasnt labeled as "high speed"

forgot you need the dos system files aswell
http://files.extremeoverclocking.com/file.php?f=196

when you use the hp format tool tick "create a dos startip disc" >using dos system files found at< and browse for the directory you put the above dos files in.

dos should boot from the usb and you will be greeted with a command prompt style interface type f3 or f3.exe

crucial has a guide for updating the firmware on one of their SSD's here using the hp boot tool, you obviously just use this guide but which the f3.exe and not a crucial firmware update
http://www.crucial.com/firmware/ProductFlyer-letter_M225-1819FirmwareUSBboot_10-09.pdf
 
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This is driving me insane. I can now load into dos, I'm using the 98 ones.

It loads up and I type F3.exe and it shows:

SFLASH V5.32 SAMSUNG Electronics Co., Ltd. (C)2000-2009
>>C:\F3.EXE @23:03

When I then reeboot there is no change to my hard drive and I still can't see it in the BIOS.

I've also tried booting into windows on my pc with the HDD attached and running F3.exe but nothing seems to be working.
 
is the hdd recognised in the bios when you try to update the firmware?

if its not the firmware obviously cant flash it.

you can force the amd 880 board to see the board if you do a warmboot (push the power button to start the comp , quickly push it again to turn it off and then almost instantly press the power button again)

you cant update the firmware from within windows you have to do it in dos
 
No, the HDD isn't recognised by the BIOS. Any idea how I can get the BIOS to recognise it? I don't know what happened that allowed me to install Windows in the first place.
 
warmboot worked for me.

power on , power off , power on
only let the first power on go for like a second then power it on and off as quick as you can with the power button.

are all of the sata ports on the board the same colour? there might be some not controlled by the sb850 southbridge that you can use to boot the disk on for a firmware upgrade.

you could also boot the computer up and atach the f3 afterwords then press the reset button.

my drive worked fine if i connected it after the bioses post test
 
My motherboard has some form of 'IDE emulation' on the SATA 2.0 ports. That helped the boot sequence recognise my optical drive.

Also, can you flash the drive from another computer?

As for Windows installer, it loads a bunch of drivers and such prior to install. It possible it recognised the drive that way and allowed you to install on it. I know I had to use the motherboard CD to install 3rd party drivers at the start of the windows install. It's all a bit fiddly.

BTW, I had no such problems with my two F3 in RAID 1 on the gigabyte 890GX board. Touch wood!
 
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depends what firmware the drive had with the dodgy one the drives dont spin up fast enough during POST so the bios never detects it and the drive just clicks trying to spinup (only happens with sb850 southbridge but its not amds fault)
 
All sorted now, thanks :) I booted with the drive powered but with not SATA cable connected. Booted into bios and plugged in SATA cable then Ctrl+Alt+Del and back into bios to see that drive was recognised, Ctrl+Alt+Del boot to USB and run F3.exe

So ridiculous that this had to be done
 
yea its ridiculous that in 2010 companies are expecting people to make dos boot disks to flash firmware surely it cant be that hard to make an iso that would auto flash a drive or atleast make it user friendly
 
I had to disable the floppy drive from BIOS for win 7 to install. Don't talk to me about ridiculous! Spent two hours installing win 7 looking for solutions to various problems on the net. Felt like I was back in the 90's trying to rig a Pentium. All I can say is, Thank God for the Internets!
 
Is it worth me writing a how to on sorting this problem? It doesn't seem many people have had it or there would be more information lying around
 
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