NEW Seagate SATA 250GB installation problems...HELP!

[weefcorp]

Hello people...my first post and i'm sure its not gona be the last.

I've spent the last two days looking for and reading the entire www for a solution to this problem, (not very well i might add, im sure the problem would've been solved then:-| ).

I've just bought a new 250gb seagate 7200.10 SATA drive as my previous 160gb seagate 7200.7 SATA one paced up for unknown reason as of yet, one prob at a time.

So know that ive bought this 1 i'm having problems installin it.

I have a GA-K8VT800, Athlon 64 3200+ and another seagate 7200.7 which im using know. Uses an IDE cable if that helps

Know to install it i went to the seagate website and downlaoded their "Disk Wizard" utility the latest one i think. and put them onto two floppy drives as stated, then used them.

Now the disk wizard prog which boots up in dos mode recognises the hard drive.

I then take the disk out, make sure only the new drive is connected and restart the computer with the xp cd in the cd drive so that i can install xp on the newdrive.

After installing a few things it then syas the normal setup question of

"Do you want to install fresh"
"Do you want repair windows"

cant remeber the 3rd one?

Anyway after selecting the 1st option as it is an oem hard drive and blank i think...as it came with no disks, manual or pretty box.

It then says it cannot detect a hard drive make sure it is connected properly blah blah blah.

Im fed up can ne 1 please help, plz:sad:
says on the blue screen that

[dcc]

Did you install the drivers? Read this and see if it helps.

[weefcorp]

Hi, thanks for replying.

I spent another few hours of trial an error and i think the problem lies in the installion of the drivers for the motherboard (i think).

Let me clarify the problem again:

I used the Seagate disk wizrd in dos with success and made a 250gb partition NTFS.
http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/support/downloads/discwizard

When i connect my old hard drive up it recognises the new drive as a 237gb partition NTFS. So thats a start.

But when i reconnect the new drive on its own and try to install xp. It just says now hard drive detected.

I went to the gigabyte website and downloaded their "download centre" prog which checks what drivers you need.

It came back with this list.

http://download.gigabyte.com.tw/Show.asp?OS=16&Language=0&Item=15&Dev1=31881106&Sub1=31881106&Dev2=b1881106&Sub2=00000000&Dev3=31491106&Sub3=b0031458&Dev4=05711106&Sub4=50021458&Dev5=30381106&Sub5=50041458&Dev6=31041106&Sub6=50041458&Dev7=32271106&Sub7=50011458&Dev8=30591106&Sub8=a0021458&Dev9=813910ec&Sub9=e0001458&Dev10=11001022&Sub10=00000000&Dev11=11011022&Sub11=00000000&Dev12=11021022&Sub12=00000000&Dev13=11031022&Sub13=00000000&Dev14=4e481002&Sub14=00021002&Dev15=4e681002&Sub15=00031002
VIA 4in1 Driver
Size
1.4MBWEB Version
4.55Local Version
4.55vFor VIA All Chipset

RealTek LAN Driver
Size
2.4MBWEB Version
5.621.0304.2005Local Version
5.621.304.2005Installs drivers for Realtek LAN Driver

VIA 8237 Serial ATA Driver for 2K/XP
Size
6.4MBWEB Version
5.1.2600.430Local Version
5.1.2600.430For VIA 8237 SATA Driver

Im not sure if i'm installin them properly!

When i check the tick box to select the "VIA 4in1 Driver" for download a small box appears sayin:

"VIA 4 in 1 driver need to reboot system!
other selected driver will be remove continue to install?"

and if i check the "VIA 8237 Serial ATA Driver for 2K/XP" box for selection i get:

"If you want to install [VIA 8237 Serial ATA Driver for 2K/XP] the [VIA 4 in 1 driver] need to remove! Continue to install?"

So i tried various combos. The first time i installed the "via 8237"and then the "VIA 4 in 1" and on reboot the xp installation cd did pick up the hard drive. But having thout the problem was solved i stopped the installation and went to bed (knackered).

Next day tried it and back to normal.

So first installed the VIA 8237 and then rebooted. Then turned off comp again and connected up the new drively solely on its own to see if it recognised it. - FAILED

The installed the VIA 4 in 1 and rebooted, then tured off comp and reconnected new hard drive on its own. - FAILED AGAIN

Thats why i think it could be the drivers ive tried many diffrent combos. Can u give me any ideas as to what to try, or what order to install or uninstall!

Also on the seagate disk wizard it says when im setting up the partition that my computer must be capable of running a partition greater than 137gb. Im not sure what it means, im guessin it can as the old hard drive is 160gb. IDE connection though,make a difference?

Another thing is the jumper setting on the back restricts it to 1.5gb/s as opposed to the 3g/s it can acheive.

Ive noticed if i take the jumper off (3gb/s setting) it says

" Hardware initiate failed. Please check device!!! The BIOS does not be installed. Press <g> to continue!"

on the first boot screen. What does that mean?

I've just realised how much i've written, hopefully this is not too much of a problem to solve.

Thanks in advance.

[weefcorp]

The F6 option is for when you have drivers for your new hard drive isn't it? I couldnt find any for this hard drive, apparetnly because its SATA 2 and Seagate it doesn't need any.

[dcc]

Ok...I'm confused, is this a SATA hdd or ATA? You mention the drive being a SATA and then mention connecting it with a IDE cable. SATA drives do not use a IDE cable.

Installation Software (DiscWizard)
Seagate simplifies the installation of hard drives with this program. This software also overcomes many system BIOS and operating system limitations that can complicate the installation of higher-capacity ATA (IDE) interface drives.

Did you download this installation wizard?

The wizard that you used should have allowed you to make a partition lagre enough for the whole drive. The limitations that they are referring to is the 137GB limit the BIOS has.

[weefcorp]

The new hard drive i am tryin to install is a 250gb seagate sata.
When i mentioned "IDE" i was referring to my old hard drive (160gb seagate) which uses an IDE connection.

Sorry for confusion.

I've used the disk wizard and was able to make an NTFS 237GB partition to the new hard drive. This drive is now visible when i connect it up with my old hard drive aswell as by my bios, but i dont want to use it as extra storage i want to install a fresh copy of windows on the drive and use it as my primary drive.

To do this i connected up the new drive on its own and stuck the windows cd in to install as normal. It gets to the point where it asks me:

1) If you would like to install a fresh copy of windows press (Enter)
2) Would you like to repair windows
3) ...........cant remeber

So i push enter to follow option 1 and it displays the message that no hard drive is found and i should check the connections etc

So what now?????!!!

Thanks for reading

[DimaYasny]

sorry, had no time to read the entire thread through, so I might repeat someone's answer :)

Anyhow, installing a new SATA drive on a modern MB is pretty easy, especially on a GigaByte MB. All you do is set the SATA mode to IDE in BIOS, and the disk will be recognized by windows as another IDE drive, no special drivers needed.
If you want to keep it in SATA RAID mode, you need to look for a floppy creating script on your GigaByte CD, one of the text readme's contains all the locations. Just create the floppy, and insert it at the F6 screen.