ok so i just put together a mini-atx pc and plug everything in and i get the following error

Media test failure, check cable
Disk boot failure, insert system disk and press enter

i have unplugged and plugged in everything a million times

also im not sure if its relevant but when i plug in the power source (last of course) two lights come on on either side of my two SATA connections but of course Shuttle wasn't nice enough to provide me with anything about the motherboard in the box

8/19/2008 6:45:30 PM

make sure your BIOS is trying to boot to the hard drives first
make sure your BIOS is set to the right option (if they are SATA drives, make sure they are set to IDE until after OS install)

if you think the hard drives are bad, test them in a different system first.

[Edited on August 19, 2008 at 6:48 PM. Reason : .]

8/19/2008 6:47:16 PM

ok i put in a different sata drive and i get the error

NTLDR is missing or something like that

8/19/2008 6:50:49 PM

ok fixed Bios so that HDDs are first and not CDROM but still same error

i dont have another system to test, i only have other drives

[Edited on August 19, 2008 at 6:57 PM. Reason : fdfd]

8/19/2008 6:52:16 PM

[Del]

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=314057
http://www.NTLDRismissing.com

[Edited on August 19, 2008 at 6:59 PM. Reason : .]

8/19/2008 6:57:10 PM

that would be helpful if i wanted to use the other hard drive i tested and not the two new ones

8/19/2008 7:02:04 PM

well can you try the two new one's in a different computer or external enclosure?

8/19/2008 7:22:10 PM

i dont have another computer or enclosure to try

i can boot from (but not succesfully) two other SATA drives and a cdrom device but these two new ones arent even recognized in the bios

8/19/2008 7:27:04 PM

I'm really going out on a limb here

but you do know that you need an OS on the harddrive to boot right ?

8/19/2008 7:48:13 PM

are you sure they aren't recognized in the bios? like, when you go into the bios what does the main screen say about hard drives? what you're telling us does not at all sound like the drives are bad--it sounds like either haven't setup an operating system, the master boot record needs to be setup on that drive, and or you have the wrong order setup in the bios of boot devices

8/19/2008 7:50:24 PM

Quote :

"I'm really going out on a limb here but you do know that you need an OS on the harddrive to boot right ?"

i guess what i meant is they are not showing up in my bios, at all, so there is no way to install an OS even after booting from the cd with windows on it

ok so heres a breakdown of what is happening

when i put the new hard drives in my system, i get the error from above
the bios recognizes my 3 OLD corrupted hard drives, my cdrom, and the lan connection as bootable devices but lists absolutely nothing about the new ones

it recognizes both old IDE and SATA drives but not the new SATA ones

and fyi, those lights that come on that i mentioned earlier, come on no matter what i plug in so i don't think they are related

also i can physically feel the drives vibrating when i plug them in so its not a power issue

[Edited on August 19, 2008 at 8:03 PM. Reason : f]

8/19/2008 8:01:10 PM

Quote :

"Media test failure, check cable"

did you swap cables?
did you swap SATA ports?

if you go into the BIOS and they are not recognized, then chances are you have a bad hard drive.

8/19/2008 8:10:37 PM

Are you setting up a RAID? Do you any old drive plugged in while trying to install and set up an OS on the new drives?

8/19/2008 10:12:26 PM

Quote :

"i guess what i meant is they are not showing up in my bios, at all, so there is no way to install an OS even after booting from the cd with windows on it"

ooook if they arent showing up in bios soon then there's annother issue that needs to be resolved. i'm not sure what jumper settings there are on a SATA drive but i'm thinking there aren't any..having two bad drives is rare

fuck im drunk

evan handle this

8/19/2008 10:32:49 PM

i just got an RMA from newegg and ill send them back and if it turns out its the motherboard then ill send that back later

8/19/2008 10:47:47 PM

yeah i really don't think it's the drives

how many SATA ports does your mobo have?

typically the chipset handles some and there may be an addon sata controller onboard that handles some more

make sure everything's enabled in the integrated devices section (if you've got an award bios)
there should be an init screen for the sata controller after the bios posts

i'd be willing to bet your two new drives are just on a different controller

what's the model number of your motherboard? i'll find out what's wrong.

8/20/2008 1:34:13 AM

Quote :

"did you swap cables? did you swap SATA ports?"

8/20/2008 12:54:46 PM

yes i swapped other cables and ports and like i also said, older sata drives show up fine so it has to be these drives

8/20/2008 3:16:55 PM

what SATA controller do you have?

some of the older chipsets don't handle the autoneg down to 1.5gbps very well. i'm assuming your new drives are 3.0gbps - try looking on them for a jumper that forces them down to 1.5gbps and see if that works.

8/20/2008 6:00:20 PM

^esp. mini-ITX

8/20/2008 6:17:50 PM