Windows 7 install not recognizing hard drive on brand new rig

[Blawkyy]

So I'm building a computer for a friend of mine, and we've encountered a problem. First of all I'll show you my entire rig we bought.

Motherboard:

GIGABYTE GA-990XA-UD3 AM3+ AMD 990X SATA 6Gb/s USB...

GPU:

EVGA 01G-P3-1556-KR GeForce GTX 550 Ti (Fermi) FPB...

PSU:

COOLER MASTER GX Series RS650-ACAAD3-US 650W ATX12...

CPU:

AMD FX-6100 Zambezi 3.3GHz Socket AM3+ 95W Six-Cor...

RAM:

G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR...

HDD:

Seagate Barracuda ST320DM000 320GB 7200 RPM 16MB C...

Disk Drive:

ASUS Black 18X DVD-ROM 48X CD-ROM SATA DVD-ROM Dri...

Windows 7 OEM:

Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 64-bit - Oper...

Case:

Rosewill CHALLENGER-U3 Black Gaming ATX Mid Tower ...

We already bought everything and have it built we're just having a problem with the Windows 7 Install.
Once we have it built completely we press the power button and are relieved to see it boot up.

We first put the Windows install disc into the disk drive and let it boot up from the CD-ROM. The set up is normally going through, we confirm we're English, then we click "Start Setup", we accept the terms of use, and then the problem occurs.

After a bit of loading we get to the screen "Where do you want to install?" The hard drive is not showing up as an option! The only window we are given is a window asking us to browse through folders through usbs, floppy disks, and cds looking for the drives that will make the hard drive show up. Since we have none of the following we decided to shut off the computer and check the sata ports and the power plugs to and from the hard drive to see if everything is plugged in correctly. We have the hard drive sata cord plugged into the #0 Sata port, which from reading other forums that was recommended. So we confirm the hard drive is plugged in correctly so we move to the BIOS.

In the BIOS we check to see if the hard drive is even showing up, and sure enough, the 320GB storage device is there in the BIOS along with the CD-ROM. Now after some research we find out we want the Sata's in "AHCI" mode so we look into the BIOS and switch the SATA option to "AHCI" from the default "Native IDE." After saving the BIOS we load up Windows again and the problem is still exactly the same, it's not recognizing the hard drive.

So we research some more and find out you can put the drives onto a flash drive off of the Gigabyte website and then browse the flash drive on Windows 7 install to get the required drives. So we go to the website and we get to the correct motherboard drives and go under the Windows 7 64-bit version and download under the "SATA RAID" group a file called AMD SATA AHCI Driver at this webpage:

http://www.gigabyte.us/products/product-page.aspx?pid=3901&dl=1#dl

We extract this file onto the flash drive and plug it into the newly built pc. We run Windows 7, we get to the screen we're stuck at and press browse, we go to the flashdrive and we see a folder called "AHCI_win7" we click on that then go to the 64 bit file, which was "Win7x64." After loading the "drives" from this, 1 drives shows up in the list that I do not recall the name exactly, maybe "SATA AHCI Controller" or something like that. We highlight that drive and click next and this green bar keeps loading onto the screen as if it's installing for about 10 seconds then it just brings us to the same screen and says "No drives, try using Browse to locate a driver for the hard drive." So the flash drive method did not work.

After more research we find out the drivers are on the motherboard disk itself, great! The answer was right with us the whole time! Just kidding, we boot up Windows 7, get to browse, pop the motherboard disk in, go to the folder and we find the drivers. Under something the manual of the motherboard told us. Something like Bootdrv>Something else>Drivers>AHCI>w764. That's just what I somewhat remember, it definitely isn't exactly like that but you get the idea. We get to the correct drive file, we open it and we once again find some more "drivers" listed. But they only list if you uncheck the box "Do not list drivers that are incompatible with your hardware" There are no drives with that checked, so we try each one of them and we get nothing each time. We turn off the computer and go back to more researching.

Discouraged enough, we've tried countless things just grasping for straws hoping that maybe something might work, I won't mention all of them as they're not necessary unless someone suggests an idea that we've already tried.

So PLEASE HELP US! I really feel bad for telling my friend we can build him a pc, have him spend all this money and it not work right away. There has to be something that we're missing, I find it extremely hard to believe that any of the pieces of the pc are faulty because everything seems to be working find besides the fact that Windows 7 doesn't want to see the hard drive.

Another thing that can be said is that after setting the SATA's to AHCI, the hard drive is no longer found in the BIOS, if that means anything.

So once again I would GREATLY appreciate it if someone could help us out and tell us what we're doing wrong. Thank you so much! I'll be here ready for questions so expect fast replies.

 

[itsakjt]

After setting the drives to AHCI it is normal that the BIOS will not show the drive. Try one thing. There is a setting named "Hard Disk Drives". Select the HDD there. And also on Boot Device priority, set the first drive as CD ROM and the second one as HDD. Nothing else. Boot the system and try installing Windows. Report back.

 

[TRWOV]

Test the drive on another PC too. Might be a faulty one.

 

[Blawkyy]

@itsakjt
I don't know what you're talking about the setting named "Hard Disk Drives." Is it in the BIOS or what?

With the boot device priority we have it set to:
1: CD-ROM
2: HDD
3. USB-HDD (This was just there by default)

Should we make the 3rd boot device to just disabled would that effect anything?

@TRWOV
Something we forgot to do today, I'll have to do it tomorrow. I'll test it on my pc. What would we be looking for? Just plugging in and going into "My Computer" and see if it's there?

 

[sttubs]

Should we make the 3rd boot device to just disabled would that effect anything?

Yes, I always put disabled on my computers.
It could be the hard drive, bad sata cable, bad sata connector on the motherboard.

 

[Yo_Wattup]

@itsakjt
I don't know what you're talking about the setting named "Hard Disk Drives." Is it in the BIOS or what?

With the boot device priority we have it set to:
1: CD-ROM
2: HDD
3. USB-HDD (This was just there by default)

Should we make the 3rd boot device to just disabled would that effect anything?

@TRWOV
Something we forgot to do today, I'll have to do it tomorrow. I'll test it on my pc. What would we be looking for? Just plugging in and going into "My Computer" and see if it's there?

You might have to format the drive, which means plugging it into another computer and going through disk management in windows. It probably won't show up in My Computer if you just plug it in.

 

[Blawkyy]

@sttubs
Then I'll disable that to see if it helps. Thanks!

@Yo_Wattup
Tomorrow we're going to put in my computer and see if reformatting works or if it even responds not being faulty.

 

[itsakjt]

@Blawkyy-Get a copy of Ubuntu. Boot it as live DVD. Open Disk Utility and see if the drive is shown there. If yes, format the whole drive and do not make any partition.

 

[Aquinus]

@Blawkyy-Get a copy of Ubuntu. Boot it as live DVD. Open Disk Utility and see if the drive is shown there. If yes, format the whole drive and do not make any partition.

Ewww, Linux GUI.

Open a terminal and find out what drives you have handy (assuming AHCI is enabled and not SATA RAID.)

sudo ls /dev/sd*

If that is the only drive in the machine, if Ubuntu detects it, it will say something like:

/dev/sda

Or if Windows formatted it on its own:

/dev/sda    /dev/sda1    /dev/sda2

Anyways, if you got this far and it is there, then it's most likely a driver issue in Windows, but just to make sure, you will need to install smart tools.

sudo apt-get install smartmontools

Then check out the drive.

sudo smartctl -a /dev/sda

Then you will get something like this:

smartctl 5.41 2011-06-09 r3365 [x86_64-linux-3.2.0-25-generic] (local build)
Copyright (C) 2002-11 by Bruce Allen, http://smartmontools.sourceforge.net

=== START OF INFORMATION SECTION ===
Model Family:     Western Digital Caviar Green
Device Model:     WDC WD10EADS-00L5B1
Serial Number:    xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
LU WWN Device Id: 5 0014ee 101cd9776
Firmware Version: 01.01A01
User Capacity:    1,000,204,886,016 bytes [1.00 TB]
Sector Size:      512 bytes logical/physical
Device is:        In smartctl database [for details use: -P show]
ATA Version is:   8
ATA Standard is:  Exact ATA specification draft version not indicated
Local Time is:    Sun Aug  5 10:55:52 2012 EDT
SMART support is: Available - device has SMART capability.
SMART support is: Enabled

=== START OF READ SMART DATA SECTION ===
SMART overall-health self-assessment test result: PASSED

General SMART Values:
Offline data collection status:  (0x82)	Offline data collection activity
					was completed without error.
					Auto Offline Data Collection: Enabled.
Self-test execution status:      (   0)	The previous self-test routine completed
					without error or no self-test has ever 
					been run.
Total time to complete Offline 
data collection: 		(24000) seconds.
Offline data collection
capabilities: 			 (0x7b) SMART execute Offline immediate.
					Auto Offline data collection on/off support.
					Suspend Offline collection upon new
					command.
					Offline surface scan supported.
					Self-test supported.
					Conveyance Self-test supported.
					Selective Self-test supported.
SMART capabilities:            (0x0003)	Saves SMART data before entering
					power-saving mode.
					Supports SMART auto save timer.
Error logging capability:        (0x01)	Error logging supported.
					General Purpose Logging supported.
Short self-test routine 
recommended polling time: 	 (   2) minutes.
Extended self-test routine
recommended polling time: 	 ( 255) minutes.
Conveyance self-test routine
recommended polling time: 	 (   5) minutes.
SCT capabilities: 	       (0x303f)	SCT Status supported.
					SCT Error Recovery Control supported.
					SCT Feature Control supported.
					SCT Data Table supported.

SMART Attributes Data Structure revision number: 16
Vendor Specific SMART Attributes with Thresholds:
ID# ATTRIBUTE_NAME          FLAG     VALUE WORST THRESH TYPE      UPDATED  WHEN_FAILED RAW_VALUE
  1 Raw_Read_Error_Rate     0x002f   200   200   051    Pre-fail  Always       -       0
  3 Spin_Up_Time            0x0027   160   159   021    Pre-fail  Always       -       6991
  4 Start_Stop_Count        0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       78
  5 Reallocated_Sector_Ct   0x0033   200   200   140    Pre-fail  Always       -       0
  7 Seek_Error_Rate         0x002e   100   253   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
  9 Power_On_Hours          0x0032   078   078   000    Old_age   Always       -       16349
 10 Spin_Retry_Count        0x0032   100   253   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
 11 Calibration_Retry_Count 0x0032   100   253   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
 12 Power_Cycle_Count       0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       57
192 Power-Off_Retract_Count 0x0032   200   200   000    Old_age   Always       -       5
193 Load_Cycle_Count        0x0032   200   200   000    Old_age   Always       -       78
194 Temperature_Celsius     0x0022   124   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       26
196 Reallocated_Event_Count 0x0032   200   200   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
197 Current_Pending_Sector  0x0032   200   200   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
198 Offline_Uncorrectable   0x0030   200   200   000    Old_age   Offline      -       0
199 UDMA_CRC_Error_Count    0x0032   200   200   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
200 Multi_Zone_Error_Rate   0x0008   200   200   000    Old_age   Offline      -       0

SMART Error Log Version: 1
No Errors Logged

SMART Self-test log structure revision number 1
Num  Test_Description    Status                  Remaining  LifeTime(hours)  LBA_of_first_error
# 1  Short offline       Completed without error       00%     16209         -
# 2  Short offline       Completed without error       00%     16209         -
# 3  Short offline       Completed without error       00%     16140         -
# 4  Extended offline    Completed without error       00%     16004         -

SMART Selective self-test log data structure revision number 1
 SPAN  MIN_LBA  MAX_LBA  CURRENT_TEST_STATUS
    1        0        0  Not_testing
    2        0        0  Not_testing
    3        0        0  Not_testing
    4        0        0  Not_testing
    5        0        0  Not_testing
Selective self-test flags (0x0):
  After scanning selected spans, do NOT read-scan remainder of disk.
If Selective self-test is pending on power-up, resume after 0 minute delay.

 

[Blawkyy]

@itsakjt and Aquinus -

Do I download this program from this?

http://www.ubuntu.com/download/desktop

And is this the only way to format the hard drive?

 

[Aquinus]

@itsakjt and Aquinus -

Do I download this program from this?

http://www.ubuntu.com/download/desktop

And is this the only way to format the hard drive?

You want the ISO image and then you want to burn it to a DVD or CD. You want to use the LiveCD to diagnose the HDD issue, not to format it.

 

[Blawkyy]

So just now we tried to reformat the disk from my computer. We got it onto my computer, did a full reformat and after putting it back in the pc and trying again, the same screen pops up with nothing. So now I guess we'll try the Ubuntu thing. Would that be the best idea?

 

[Yo_Wattup]

Deleted

 

[TRWOV]

Ok then the HDD worked fine in your PC, right?

shoot in the dark:
1. Reset CMOS
2. Set SATA mode to AHCI, if the board has the option, set Hot Plug as "disabled"
3. Try installing.
3.1 if 3 fails, try other SATA ports.

out of ideas

 

[Aquinus]

Still pop open Ubuntu and check to see if the drive is even there. You're running AHCI and not IDE or RAID, right? Additionally if the optical drive is SATA as well, try that on another port to make sure the ports are actually working, try changing the SATA cable unless you used that on the other and worked as well. I'm really curious if Ubuntu sees it though, because Linux is pretty flexible when it comes to detecting hard drives. Fake RAID like Intel RST is a little annoying, but you can still usually find it under /dev/mapper if it is enabled.

 

[Blawkyy]

So I have the same exact Seagate barracude 320GB hard drive that runs my computer. So what we decided to do is put my hard drive into my friends newly built system without the new hard drive and see if the computer would load it to check if the motherboard would run that specific type of hard drive. It did in fact work and boot up as a normal computer with my hard drive. So since my motherboard was capable of seeing that hard drive and working when I built MY computer, we decided to put his brand new hard drive into my computer alone, boot the computer using his windows 7 disc in the CD-ROM and see if we can install it onto the hard drive through my computer. Sadly, the same screen popped up not working at all.

With this information we have came to the conclusion that this specific hard drive must be faulty in some way.

How could my hard drive work fine with a new, same EXACT hard drive, then not work with his new hard drive in the same scenario? It must be the hard drive not working properly.

@TRWOV

Yes, this is what also puzzles me. Because as soon as I turned on my computer with the new hard drive in as a secondary, windows popped up saying that we should format it so it can be usable, we formatted it (not fast format) and afterwards it was visible in "My Computer" It seemed as if we were able to just drag files into it as normal. We did not test that though. So the secondary(supposedly faulty) hard drive did work as a secondary.

I don't know if there is any other possibility that something else is going wrong please let me know, otherwise we're most likely sending the hard drive through RMA to get a new one.

@Aquinus

We tried doing Ubuntu, we got it on a disk and ran my computer with the boot temporarily as the CD-ROM with the burned disk in, the ubuntu screen came up and appeared to be loading but then the screen goes black and nothing happens. So Ubuntu ended up not working and we got the above idea as we were doing that so we did that instead.

 

[Aquinus]

@Aquinus

We tried doing Ubuntu, we got it on a disk and ran my computer with the boot temporarily as the CD-ROM with the burned disk in, the ubuntu screen came up and appeared to be loading but then the screen goes black and nothing happens. So Ubuntu ended up not working and we got the above idea as we were doing that so we did that instead.

So it finished installing but it wouldn't boot?

 

[Blawkyy]

So it finished installing but it wouldn't boot?

Correct.

 

[Aquinus]

How does the boot order look? Can you see the drive in the BIOS using AHCI?

 

[Blawkyy]

How does the boot order look? Can you see the drive in the BIOS using AHCI?

When? During the Ubuntu? I can't even see anything it doesn't work.
When the hard drive was on my computer as a secondary it was seen in the BIOS in AHCI

 

[Beertintedgoggles]

I've had this issue with an install of XP a while ago. The PCB on the hard drive was still fine and talking with the BIOS but the motor was dead and the platters wouldn't spin.

 

[Aquinus]

When? During the Ubuntu? I can't even see anything it doesn't work.
When the hard drive was on my computer as a secondary it was seen in the BIOS in AHCI

No, in the BIOS.

Also what do you mean as a secondary? When Windows was installed on another disk and this one wasn't your boot drive?

 

[sttubs]

With this information we have came to the conclusion that this specific hard drive must be faulty in some way.

I agree with your assessment since you've done everything to it. I would just RMA it & quit wasting time.

 

[Blawkyy]

No, in the BIOS.

Also what do you mean as a secondary? When Windows was installed on another disk and this one wasn't your boot drive?

We put his hard drive into my computer as a second hard drive to format. That's what I mean when I say secondary. But when we also put his hard drive in my computer alone we went into the BIOS and the hard drive was visible under AHCI. It just wasn't visible in AHCI when it was in the newly built computer.

 

[Aquinus]

It just wasn't visible in AHCI when it was in the newly built computer.

Have you confirmed that the port works on the motherboard on the new machine? Have you tried moving the optical drive to that port to see if it still works (if you have a SATA optical drive?)