2 HD's on one computer

[Lee535]

I bought a new Seagate 40 GB HD (ATA/100) and a new ATA/100 controller card (the original controller on the motherboard is a ATA/33) to add to my Gateway Pentium III (500 mhz) PC. The original HD is a 20GB (ATA/66) Western Digital. I have both HD's on the new controller Primary channel. The 40GB is set to master and the 20GB is set to slave. The problem is the system won't assign a drive letter to the 20 GB HD. The 20GB seems to be recognized on bootup and in the system listing and the 20GB seems is be working ok - and letter D is reserved for it. Anyone have any ideas why my system won't assign a letter D to the 20GB? Other than this, everything seems to be working great.

Thanks,

Tim

[RJ]

Hello and welcome to PC Mech.

For UDMA66/100 drives connected to a UDMA66/100 cable (it has colored connections, blue to controller, black to master, grey to slave) you need to jumper both drives cable select.

RJ

[Lee535]

I changed both drives to cable select and the 20GB drive is still not being assigned a letter. I've read a little about FAT32 that all drives use now -- is it possible that the 20GB drive is not formatted for FAT32 -- I haven't reformatted it -- would this keep the drive from being assigned a letter as a slave? -- it worked as a master before.

My PC has WIN98 if that matters.

Tim

[Naja]

Somebody correct me if I'm wrong, but:

If you haven't partitioned/formatted it--then it won't assign a drive letter.
it will show as Disk 1, but each partition will be assigned a drive letter.

HDs:
Disk 0=40g-Master
Disk 1=20g-Slave

In other words, if you create one large (20g) partition--it will have a D:\ drive letter.
If you create two 10g partitions--one will be D:\ and one will be E:\ (or whatever letter U assign to it.)

Also, I don't understand: the 20g is the old HD, right? Unless you've UNpartitioned and UNformatted it--it should be partitioned and formatted, right?

Anyway,
HTH

[RJ]

If you haven't partitioned/formatted it--then it won't assign a drive letter.

Doesn't need to be formatted. As soon as it's partitioned it'll get a drive letter.

Does the controller card detect the drive ? If so then it's probably really not paritioned, use FDISK to do that.

RJ

[mike breck]

I would put the 20GB on the motherboard IDE 1 channel and then use the WD Data Lifeguard tools to Write Zeros (aka Low Level Format) to the 20GB.

Then use FDISK to delete any existing partitions, create an extended partition with a logical partition, and then format it.

Then put the 20GB back on the Controller card and see if Windows will assign a drive letter to it.

As RJ said, jumper both HDs to CS on an ATA66/100 cable.

If you're still having problems, then try putting the 20GB on the Secondary Controller card channel. Sometimes two different brands of HDs don't mix well on the same channel.

[Confused]

Did you system only have the 20G drive with WIN98 on it originally?

Is WIN98 still on the 20G drive?

Are you sure that it is the 20G not being seen? If it is booting up, then the 20G is "C" and it is waiting for the 40G to be formatted and partitioned to be assigned a drive letter.

Chas

As a note to one of your other questions. WIN98 uses FAT32 so that isn't the problem.

[morriswindgate]

If I were you I would put the New Drive on the Controller Card's IDE 1 as a Master or cable select and the old Drive on the Card's IDE2 as a Master.
And you know that you have to use an 80 conductor ATA66/100 cable to use cable select.

[Lee535]

Responses to qustions:

The 20GB drive is still formatted as a single partition as it was originally -- I haven't reformatted it.

Both drives are detected on startup (I assume this means the controller card is detecting the 20 GB) and both are shown in the system listing in the control panel device manager.

The 20GB was the original single drive on the WIN98 PC.

WIN98 is still on the 20GB.

I'm sure it's the 20GB that's not being assigned a letter. I'm sure it's booting on the new 40GB.

I do have the 80 conductor cable.

-------------------------------

I just wondered if the 20GB was using FAT16 instead of FAT32 -- although it came with a WIN98 system -- and now it's set up as a slave with a master using FAT32 -- just wondered if this would cause a problem. I don't know how to determine if the 20GB is using FAT32.


Thanks to all -- I'll try the suggestions.

Tim

[Confused]

Originally posted by Lee535 Responses to qustions: WIN98 is still on the 20GB. I'm sure it's the 20GB that's not being assigned a letter. I'm sure it's booting on the new 40GB. Thanks to all -- I'll try the suggestions. Tim

I read thru again and see no place where you formatted, partitioned, or loaded a OS on the 40G drive. So if you didn't load a OS to the 40G drive, it can only boot from the 20G drive which is "C". It cannot boot from the 40G if it hasn't been formatted and had a OS loaded to it.

It's WIN98, It's FAT32.
Chas

[Lee535]

I did format the 40GB and put WIN98 on it -- I didn't have any trouble with that so guess I didn't highlight this fact -- I made the 20GB a master on the secondary channel of the new controller and had the same result so this didn't help.

I finallly just gave in and reformatted the 20GB Western Digital drive using the Seagate software that came with the new 40GB drive -- and the system then assigned a D to the 20GB. I don't understand why it was necessary to reformat the 20GB but that seems to have solved the problem -- so I assume something was wrong on that drive that the reformat eliminated.

Thanks for all the input.

Tim

[Naja]

Hi Tim,

I'm not sure so someone else will have to confirm, But:

When you booted up on either drive--they both had C:\ drives--the OS may have only recognized/displayed its OWN C:\ and not both. Changing the drive letter on the 20g C:\ may have solved it, but I don't even know if you can change drive letters like that on 98. You can on XP though.