Drives not detected

Cody_M · Oct 5, 2010

I borrowed a computer (mine got fried) but it does not detect either of the disc drive (CD I think) or the 3.5 drive.
I installed a newer 3.5 drive that I know is good and it is not detected either.
The computer seems to run well otherwise but I need the 3.5 urgently as all my documents are saved to 3.5.
I also ran both Belarc Advisor and Everest and they only recognized the Hard Drive.
The boot menu (F11) only lists the hard drive and only the Hard Drive is listed in the device manager.
I tried to get into setup (F2 according to directions) but got no reaction.
Any help would be appreciated.
Thanks - Cody

Caliban · Oct 6, 2010

Need to know your operating system and service pack #, make, model #, and service tag #, etc.

By '3.5 drive', do you mean a discrete USB drive, or an IDE drive mounted in a USB enclosure? Please clarify and provide drive and setup details.

Cody_M · Oct 7, 2010

Caliban said: ↑

Need to know your operating system and service pack #, make, model #, and service tag #, etc.

- Windows XP Home Edition Service Pack 3 (build 2600
- Processor a Main Circuit Board b
1.60 gigahertz AMD Sempron
128 kilobyte primary memory cache
128 kilobyte secondary memory cache
64-bit ready
Not hyper-threaded
- WDC WD800BB-00JKC0 [Hard drive] (80.03 GB) -- drive 0, s/n WD-WCAMD4181926, rev 05.01C05, SMART Status: Healthy
- Board: K8Upgrade-VM800 1.00 (AS Rock)
Bus Clock: 200 megahertz
BIOS: American Megatrends Inc. P1.70 09/09/2005

This is a borrowed computer with no labels - the above is copied from Belarc Advisor

By '3.5 drive', do you mean a discrete USB drive, or an IDE drive mounted in a USB enclosure? Please clarify and provide drive and setup details.
Click to expand...

I don't know what a discrete USB drive or IDE drive is -I'm referring to a 3.5 Floppy drive.

Any suggestions appreciated - Thanks
Cody

Caliban · Oct 7, 2010

Ok - sorry for the mixup.

Why can't you access your BIOS? We need to get in there, see if the drives are recognized. Try Del, other F keys, Ctrl, etc. - we may not be able to explore your chipset drivers if you can't figure out how to get into setup.

American Megatrends is by default 'Delete', but OEMs tend to change the access keys for some reason - a quick list is here.

Cody_M · Oct 9, 2010

Thanks Caliban;

On the inicator page at boot-up is F2 for setup and F11 for boot menu
F 11 will take me to the boot menu but F2 seems to not do anything. Is there another way into set-up? (I've tried these (plus Del) dozens of times)

Cody

plodr · Oct 10, 2010

Easiest solution, buy a USB floppy drive to use. I have my husband's two computers each set up with an external floppy drive. On the all-in-one computer, the floppy drive no longer works, even though A is showing. He does all his floppy files through B; the USB floppy drive. The other computer does not have a floppy and when I opened it up to install an internal floppy drive, I saw it would require me to buy some sort of special cage from Dell to have somewhere to screw the drive into place. I closed the computer up and attached another USB floppy drive.

example: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ..._floppy_drive_external-_-21-103-402-_-Product

Cody_M · Oct 11, 2010

Caliban & Plodr;

Thanks so much for the help.

I took a chance and bought a cheap, used keyboard - hooked it up and the
F2 key worked. I got into setup and "YES" the drive was disabled. I enabled it and it worked.

I also appreciate the suggestion about an external 3.5 USB Drive - good thought; I will follow it up.

Thank you so very much for everything

Cody

Caliban · Oct 11, 2010

Ah, the old keyboard trick, eh?

Glad you got it - good job. :major

Log in or Sign up

Drives not detected

Cody_M Private E-2

Caliban I don't need no steenkin' title!

Cody_M Private E-2

Caliban I don't need no steenkin' title!

Cody_M Private E-2

plodr MajorGeek Super Extraordinaire Moderator Staff Member

Cody_M Private E-2

Caliban I don't need no steenkin' title!