I have replaced my old hard drive (HD-O) with a new hard drive (HD-N) because the operating system was corrupt and could not be repaired without erasing HD-O according to Dell. HD-N now is working fine with MS XP. However I can’t get the computer to recognize HD-O (tested and operational) so I can transfer (or even access) all of my data.

Here are my settings and additional info:
HD-N (Primary Drive 0) – Western Digital 120 MG, Primary master with the jumper settings set to “Cable Select�, connected to the end or last IDE connector
HD-O (Primary Drive 1) – Western Digital 60 MG, Primary slave with the jumper settings set to “Cable Select�, connected to the middle IDE connector
I have tried setting the drives to Master / Slave respectively with no improvement.

System Setup is set to detect Primary Drive 1 (set drive type to “Auto�). Boot sequence is set to CD-Rom first then HD-N (drive C)

When I start as configured above, XP appears to begin to load but then all I get is a blank screen.
Without HD-O connected I start up fine (except I do have to hit F1 at startup to load XP because the system is looking for Primary Drive 1).
I have run every test on the HD-O I can come up with (including IDE Drive diagnostics) and it passes.

Any suggestions?

Try testing by setting Drive-0 (the old hard disk) to master, and put it on the secondary controller. If you have no problems like that, then go back to your Jumper diagrams, you must have missed something. (Some hard disks have a master AND Master with slave present setting, and if you have a slave, you must pick the second).

Hope this helps.

If you just want to access/transfer the data, this may work, but it will cost you more $$. Get an external case for the drive that connects through the USB port. I have one for that purpose and change drives in it all the time; doesn't seem to matter what the jumper settings are.

If you want to keep it in the computer as a slave, I have no idea :rolleyes: sorry.

If HD-0 is set to Master, are you able to boot from a Windows XP Cd to a Dos Prompt and access the drive directory?

go to pctech on the internet and have a look in their tutorials which are very informative