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Question

Error Message: Hard Drive Not Found What to do?

Feb 23, 2016 2:35AM PST

WinXP Pro Dell Latitude D620, all hard drives- I get the error message: "hard drive not found." What can I do to fix this?

Discussion is locked

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Answer
Re: fix
Feb 23, 2016 3:12AM PST

1. Check the cables.
2. See if Linux (booted from DVD) sees the drives
3. Try another hard drive.
4. Replace the motherboard
5. Buy another laptop.

Some questions:
- What exactly do you mean with "all hard drives"? Most laptops have only one, although they can be partitioned into more than 1 partition.
- When exactly do you get that message?
- Where do you get that message (in the BIOS, in Windows disk management, when using GPARTED from CD)?

Kees

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Answer
Look in device manager and see
Feb 24, 2016 4:40AM PST

what it says under disk drives. Does the computer boot? Usually the error is no OS found if it can't find the drive with the OS. Also with the drives of today they usually send you a message when the drive is about to fail.

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Answer
Answer to Questions by Kees
Feb 24, 2016 9:22PM PST

I replaced the old drive with a formatted new one, still I get "no hard drive found", when I turn on the computer. Next, I took out a perfectly good hard drive, functional, from a D620 that is in good operation, and still get the same message: "hard drive not found". I think I have eliminated the idea that it is a faulty hard drive that is causing my problem.

I cannot update BIOS until I can boot the computer...

Thank you for your patience.
Dr. Deb

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Answer
This sounds like a cable or motherboard failure.
Feb 25, 2016 8:18AM PST

I'm not there to look at this motherboard but given you put in a good SATA (confirm that) HDD it looks like a failed controller. Just on the off chance someone/thing disabled the controller, get into the BIOS (see dell docs) and load factory defaults.

If that fails, time to consider a new or working motherboard. But we don't fix such an old laptop today. I have made bootable USB sticks to show an otherwise working machine that can be used for surfing and minor work but the story here tells me this one is good for spare parts (other than mainboard.)