Hi,
Over the last few days ive been trying to fit a second harddirve to my comp. The second HD is a 20GB quantum fireball and the one already installed is an 80GB Western Digital.

So far ive tried (if i done it right  ): Setting one as master and one as slave and connecting them on the same IDE cable. Connecting them on a different IDE cable. Leaving the jumpers of the slave HD off. But still nothing.

All that happens is when i boot, the system sort of hangs at the bios screen for about 10 secs where it displays "Detecting IDE Drives..." after which it shows only my 80GB drive as being present and wont boot into windows.

I dont really know what to try next so some advice would be greatly appreciated.  

Boss

P.S If it helps, my motherboard is a Gigabyte 7VAXP shown Here

Yeah im pretty sure i did have one set one to slave and one set to master, and the 80GB that was set to master was plugged into IDE1 as per the mobo manual. The CD and DVD drives are on the same IDE cable and are plugged into IDE2.

And the second HD was plugged into IDE3.

Boss

Thanks for that Sandra, ill give it a go later. I found this kind of guide that came with the motherboard and it says

Please connect first HD to IDE1 and connect CDROM to IDE2 (which is how my comp is the now)
Then it says, if you wish to use IDE3 and 4 please use it in unity with BIOS. Then install the correct driver to have proper operation. For details, please refer to the RAID manual.

What does unity with bios mean and how do i do it  

Thanks in advance.

Boss

Big_Boss, if the second HDD is on a channel of its own it needs to be set as Master.

As Sandra said, it then just a question of allowing the BIOS to detect the drive. There is usually a "Detect IDE drives" option in the BIOS to do this for you. Alternatively you can the drive detection to Auto on some boards.

As for the RAID; once it is enabled it should behave just like a normal IDE. I haven't used a board with built-in RAID so I'm not certain

If you are running XP, drivers should load automatically for the RAID, otherwise there'll be some drivers on your mobo's driver CD that you'll need to install.

Ok got a bit further. Done as Adept said with each on seperate cables and both set to master. On the first BIOS screen still only the 80GB drive is detected. I then went into the bios and changed the only setting i could see to do with RAID from "ATA" to RAID

Windows will now boot. (With it set to ATA, windows hung at the loading windows screen)

Once booted windows installed RAID drivers i think and prompted me for my mobo cd which i inserted.

However still only one HD, the 80GB one is detected, however, the last bios screen before the windows screen comes up, the other HD IS there.

I dont know what to do now. Assistance would be appreciated.

Hope this makes sense

Boss

Yeah im talking to a m8 about that just now actually, ill put it back to ATA.

Im on XP Pro.

Boss

Would it not be better to forget about the extra complication of the raid part of the bios/board and either put the new drive back as a slave on the primary IDE or even as a master by itself on the primary IDE just to see if it auto detects it as its booting up  

WOO HOO!!!!!!  

I followed what you and my m8 said and it worked first time  

I connected them both on the same IDE cable with one as master and one as slave and changed the RAID setting back to ATA. I also made sure the master drive was on the end connector (as sandra said  )

Im sure this is exactly how i had it originally but obviously not, but now its working.

Thanks to all of you (and my m8, who i now owe an E-Beer  )

Now i got the easier task of finding stuff to fill it with  

Boss