SATA drive only detected half the time

Cooners · 30 Sep 2006 at 08:45

Hi I'm having a problem with my HD it only seems to want to get detected on boot up half of the time, I can always hear it click as I turn the computer but then it does not show on the screen or in bois, but other times it pops striaght up, I have tried changing the SATA cable but it has made no difference, any ideas.

Thanks

Cooners · 1 Oct 2006 at 09:46

Motherboard is a Asus A8N-SLI SE (not sure what southbridge is on it), PSU is 500w (not sure of the make but it's nothing special), hard drive is a maxtor SATA (a few years old now).

I gave up and installed windows onto an old 20gb drive I had kicking around the house and that seems to be working and windows picks up the sata drive wheather it was detected on start up or not now, but now every time I try to use the SATA drive for more than 30 seconds it freezes and I have to re-boot, I've tried all four SATA plugs on the motherboard and three different cables but nothing seems to help.
The drive worked fine in my old system before the power supply blew and took out the motherboard but since I put it in this system it's been nothing but trouble.

Cooners · 3 Oct 2006 at 18:32

Ok this is getting really annoying, I'm now trying to copy everything off onto a PATA drive before I try formating it but it won't stay connected long enough to do it, it just keeps making a sound like a USB device disconnecting.

Cooners · 4 Oct 2006 at 00:25

Well I've copied everything off it now, tried formating it but it cut out half way though, gonna take it to a friends house and get them to test it for me cause at the moment I'm using PATA drives cause I don't want to waste money on a SATA drive if it isn't going to work properley.

Thanks for the help.

Cooners · 4 Oct 2006 at 17:21

Tried three data cables and tried powering it using the SATA power connetor and the normal power connetor, I'll try using bluetak though, it might just work thanks.