Need Urgent help on Hard is issue.

I am having 20GB Maxtor Hard disk. Model : 2B02H1

1) It is getting easily detected BIOS.

2) But after that when computer boot [post] it says primary master hard disk fail.

3) If continue by pressing F1 it does not get recognized by fdisk or XP setup.

4) If any another perfectly fine working hard disk attach even on another IDE slot that also say as fail.

[ Primary master fail] [ Secondary master fail]
Same thing appear even if swap both the hard disk.

I belive this might have happen as primary partition is not formated & I made extended partition active using fdisk of win98.

if I get some how access of hard disk & reformat may resolve my problem.

But under BIOS auto detect IDE hard drive is getting detected but not while booting computer. & Gives hard disk fail message.

So is there any utility which can detect hard disk even if it get fail to recognize while system boot. & not getting recognize by fdisk.

First, check the cables and the jumper setting of master and slave drive.
Check in BIOS if you can read the RIGHT logical parameters of the drive (cyl/Hds/Sectors) , if NOT your HDD has a firmware problem.
The same if the drive is recognised with the factory alias , for example MAXTOR CALYPSO or MAXTOR ATHENA or MAXTOR ROMULUS instead of the model (try on another PC)
In some rare case the responsible is the controller board on the HDD but DON'T TRY TO SWAP the board with another one because there are compatibility issues between boards.
Regards.

first see that under bios what size is hdd showing..If it is showing name as " ATHENA " and showing 0 MB .then ur hdd has fw problem..

and u can solve this problem by flashing/rewriting fw.

go to this site
http://www.salvationdata.com

download maxtor firmware repairer..and see its manual..

for further details...PM me i will tell u step by step the sol.
or add me

arfaizy13@hotmail.com