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Question

Laptop Internal hard disk drive not found Issue

by Sep 4, 2018 11:17PM PDT

My Dell Vostro 2520 64-bit laptop. Shows the following error on power on.

Internal hard disk drive not found

To resolve this issue, try reseat the drive

No bootable devices -- strike F1 to retry boot, F2 enter setup menu, F5 enter PSA

I ran the F5 Dell internal diagnostic tool. It shows all the rest of the peripherals working correctly except no hard drive status.

The last thing I did with the laptop was to install Virtual Box and install Windows 7 32-bit OS in the virtual guest machine. The next day I got the hard disk not found error. So tried to repair any possible corrupt OS to boot from USB drive but on reboot I get a similar "No bootable devices" error. The laptop should boot from the usb drive or not?

The legacy option is enabled and secure boot is disabled in the BIOS.

What could be the possible cause and fix for the problem.

Discussion is locked

5 Posts
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Clarification Request
Did you test it with the secure boot enabled?
by r. proffitt Forum moderator Sep 5, 2018 8:45AM PDT

I did find drive letters and contents vanish with that disabled. The Linux test ignores such things.

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Answer
Re: disk drive not found
by Forum moderator Sep 5, 2018 1:22AM PDT

That could be a defective disk drive.
Are you sure the USB drive you try to boot from is bootable? What does it contain? What do you want to do with it?
Are you sure the BIOS is set to boot from the USB first?

Try booting from a Linux disc or stick (free to make) and use its filemanager to have a look at that hard disk.

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Answer
System Recovery Option not shown for next time
by Sep 10, 2018 5:18AM PDT

Tried to boot from USB drive to repair windows. For the first time the System Recovery Option window showed up but could not select c:/ drive to complete. The next option is to run commands from command prompt but when powered on the laptop that same 'The windows manager. The windows boot configuration data file does not contain valid entry' screen is shown instead of booting from usb drive to show System Recovery Options. Tried all short F8, Shift + F10, nothing happened. Somewhere it is missing.

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Re: not shown
by Kees_B Forum moderator Sep 10, 2018 6:50AM PDT

Apparently, it's one of these 3:
1. The USB-stick you boot from is compromised. Check if it works on another PC. If necessary, make a new one that works or boot from CD/DVD in stead of from USB.
2. You're not booting from that drive, because some setting in the BIOS is wrong or you don't choose that drive from the 'where to boot from'-menu
3. You're not booting from that drive due to some hardware error.

To diagnose #2 and #3, you can try to boot from any other bootable stick or disc, such as a Linux distro.

It's up to you to find out. You're the only one who has access to that laptop. If no luck, find a repair shop to help you.

Post was last edited on September 10, 2018 7:01 AM PDT

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Answer
Laptop Internal hard disk drive not found Issue
by Sep 20, 2018 11:26AM PDT

First, you just check the bios system in which hard disk enable. if the hard drive enables in the bios than open laptop back hard drive portion and pulling out hard drive from the laptop and clean its point then fix it into laptop back. know you check that hard drive is working?

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