Hello, this is my first attempt at trying to repair a harddrive. I bought a harddrive from ebay in which case the seller didn't know if it worked or not. It was cheap enough so I bought it because I'm low on cash and can't afford to buy a used one.

So, I connected this harddrive to my sisters computer via usb which it recognized by windows. So when I input it in my laptop to install windows 7 pro it gets to the point where your suppose to see the drive. In this case, I can't see the drive and it gives an error "no drives found, please install driver". I went online and found every solution to this error and tried it. Nothing works. It is a hitachi brand hd.

I tried a test and it said there were no bad sectors. I can here the hard drive spinning. I'm at a loss. Is there anyway to fix this harddrive.

What is the model and capacity of the hard disk ?
What tools did you run to test the drive?

If the drive works via the USB , then the problem can be with the Laptop.
Have you tested the laptop with another drive?
Does the laptop detect the drive in the BIOS ?

Check for drive settings in the BIOS of the laptop too.

You don't have to repair/fix a harddrive if (according to you) its working

Check your BIOS setting on this system. When you boot up your computer press delete or F1 or F2 to go to your Bios. See what it says in the Bios you should see the drive. See how it is identified in the Bios of this system. You might have to change the way it is set up in your BIOS and start again. Normally with Windows 7 it should install on this one. I have an ACER laptop that came with Windows XP on it. When I replaced the HDD it gave me same error no HDD present. But when installing Windows 7 it installed fine. The laptop was a small 10.5 and was not able to change the drive config in the BIOS but windows 7 can handle this where XP needs to have the F3 pushed and a floppy to work with the program to install the correct driver and see the disk.

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Iorana Haraharaini

The harddrive is Toshiba MK4026GAX 40GB. When I go into the bios I only see the cd-rom and pci lan iba OE Slot 0208v1217. I used a program on hiren's boot cd to check the bad sectors. It didn't come up with any. Right now, I have been using drevitalize which has found 22 bad sectors so far. It has been running all night and is extremely slow. I see it has found them but it doesn't show it has repaired them yet.

If it has so many bad sectors why is it that it can connect via usb to another computer. I have two laptops which I comes out the same way when I input the drives.

Which tools would I need to fix it.

For This Problem Easy Way Is Go To Your Bios And Then See In The Drive Setting Or Other Setting For Seleting The AHCI or SATA Native Mode Fuction And Set It AHCI if u want to install the Windows 7 OS and if u want to install the Windows XP Then Select The IDE Mode. Actuly This Is Not Problem But Older Windows Xp Have No Latest AHCI Drivers AHCI Is The "Advanced Host Control Interface" That Control The Mass Storage Device Mainly Hard Drive. Or If U Want To Patch Perment Drivers For New AHCI Drivers Then UNTEND Your XP Cd Using The NLite Tool Its Easy To Untend Your Windows Xp Source.

Unfortunately, this laptop which is a T43 laptop doesn't give an option to choose between sata and ide in the bios. also, the harddrive isn't seen in the bios. I used hdd regenerator and it said there were no bad sectors but it has 1 delay. Still Windows 7 doesn't see the drive. This is weird.

T43 laptops have compatibility issues with some make of drives.

http://forums.lenovo.com/t5/T61-and-pri ... td-p/21890

If the drive works fine in an USB enclosure, then the problem is not with the drive but some compatibility issue with the laptop.
If the drive has errors and not working properly, use another drive in the laptop and test it

I had some issues with laptops several years back when changing out the HDD and trying to install Windows XP on it. You can try the following I know it has worked for me other than this you might have to purchase a different HDD for this one.

You can go to the manufacture website and download the SATA drivers that work with windows. it is a small file. When windows is first started you would press the F2 or F3 to load this driver. Then after you load the driver windows will continue to load the rest of the initial boot on the computer and then you should see the HDD on there. You may also download nlite and use the driver you created along with your Windows disk and make a new disk to use with the driver installed on it. This one works very well.

One time I found on ebay a HDD bay that hooked into the laptop that would allow the install program to see and ID this drive. The bay would teat the HDD as a IDE drive. I do not remember where I purchased this one or even if they still make them. I have not had these sort of isses on laptop in over 4 years so I no longer even know where the bay is any longer.

Your laptop is old and the driver should be on the website they might be in archieves and it is worth looking at and downloading. If this all fails then you might need to look at a different drive for this laptop. Aslo can you try and use Windows XP on this one to see what happens. This is an older model laptop and I can not say for sure but Windows 7 could have issues installing this one. You might also want to check your install disk to make sure there is no scratches on this one. One time the client install disk had some scratches on it and when it came time to recognize the HDD and install the progam it would not do this one for me. I used a different install disk and bypassed this problem.

Now these are only ideas to this and what has worked for me on different clients computer when installing a new HDD for them. I can not say this one will work for you but you might want to try a few of these ideas for you.

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Iorana Haraharaini

I will try this and report back.

Is there a way to take the ide connector off the motherboard and put a sata connector because I have a sata drive that I could use for it that I know is good.

No you cant replace an IDE connection with a SATA. Im a bit confused though, the BIOS must see the hard drive if Hirens etc is picking it up. If you have a sata drive and a sata caddy for the drive to go into, and that laptop supports booting from a USB drive, you could always install the OS onto the external drive. Not ideal but might be a temporary solution.

If you are desperate, get a cheap USB pen and put Ubuntu onto it. You will of course need access to another computer to do this, but as your writing in the forum Ill assume you have that. Again laptop will need to support booting from a USB device and off the top of my head, i cant remember if that laptop does.

I am sorry but it would of been nice to say you were using an IDE drive and not a SATA drive on this one. You can have some bad connectors on your MB IDE. I would check your MB IDE connector and make sure none of the pins are bent on this one. Also check the way you have connected the adaptor to the HDD before installing this into the bay. Make sure that you are receiving a good connection on this one. If not then you could have some issues on the MB of this laptop and the IDE connection where you are installing this HDD.

With IDE drives it is set up in your BIOS that is why you can not change this one. But if you connect this to the MB and you can not see this in the BIOS then your problem is elsewhere. This laptop should support the 40GB hard drive with no problem at all. I had one laptop that a client tried to replace the HDD in and he broke the IDE connector that went to the HDD and attached to the MB. This caused the HDD to not been seen in the BIOS.

Note I am just giving you some idea of what to check. it is hard to know why this is not connecting to your laptop but is seen by the USB enclosure on another computer. I am not sure how you have run the programs on this if the drive was connected on the laptop and you booted up with the disk to test this drive. Are you sure this is not seen in the BIOS. From all you say it is very different each time. One time we are lead to believe this is a SATA drive now it is IDE. You can test the HDD but now it can not connect to two different laptops. Wow this one is amazing. Sounds like maybe you have bent one of the pins on the IDE port of the drive and you do not have a good connection. Examine the IDE pins on your drive. IDE pins can be bent easily when you are attaching them from one location to another if you are not careful.

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Iorana Haraharaini

I checked the pins and all are fine. Unfortunately, I think my only option is to buy another drive for this computer. My boyfriend will just have to share his computer with me until we can get another drive.

I checked the pins and all are fine. Unfortunately, I think my only option is to buy another drive for this computer. My boyfriend will just have to share his computer with me until we can get another drive.

How and where does Windows recognise it? In Device Manager as a USB mass storage device? In Disk Management? In My Computer / Windows Explorer?

Be aware that Device Manager may be detecting the small PCB (bridge board) inside the enclosure rather than the drive behind the bridge.

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A backup a day keeps DR away.