Hard Drive Disappeared

Simon · Nov 27, 2020, 13:20:57

Last night I turned on my desktop PC and noticed a few desktop icons were missing. These were all 'custom' icons from images stored on the PC. I rebooted, and refreshed the icon cache, to no avail, and then found that my 'D' and 'E' drives (partitioned, but housed on the same hard drive) were 'not available'.

The drives have vanished from My Computer, Device Manager and the BIOS, so would I be correct in assuming that the drive unit has failed and is simply 'as the dodo'?

Luckily I have recent backups, and have ordered a replacement hard drive, but any other suggestions would be gratefully received, in case I'm missing something.

Simon · Nov 27, 2020, 13:25:58

Further question - the drive is backed up with Acronis as a complete drive with partitions. The new drive is double the capacity of the old drive, so will I need to create partitions on the new drive before running the restoration from the backup, or will Acronis automatically create the partitions?

sparky · Nov 27, 2020, 14:19:05

Don't know about Acronis,

But I have an intermittent problem with my hard drives on my desktop sometimes disappearing. I can get them back by re-seating the Sata cables and the drive Power cables, I just haven't got down to finally isolating which one it is yet. Mine, could simply be a Sata cable issue. Might be worth a try just reseating the cables at the drive end and the motherboard end.

zappaDPJ · Nov 27, 2020, 15:32:33

Can the physical drive be seen in the BIOS?

Simon · Nov 27, 2020, 17:25:40

Quote from: zappaDPJ on Nov 27, 2020, 15:32:33
Can the physical drive be seen in the BIOS?

No, it's not there. It's as if it's been physically removed.

Quote from: sparky on Nov 27, 2020, 14:19:05
Don't know about Acronis,

But I have an intermittent problem with my hard drives on my desktop sometimes disappearing. I can get them back by re-seating the Sata cables and the drive Power cables, I just haven't got down to finally isolating which one it is yet. Mine, could simply be a Sata cable issue. Might be worth a try just reseating the cables at the drive end and the motherboard end.

I did wiggle the cables and they all seemed secure last night, but I must admit, I didn't disconnect and reconnect them all. I have a bit of an issue with the SATA connectors at the motherboard end, as they are particularly fiddly and troublesome to get to, so I really don't want to have to mess with them.

Just to add, the hard drive that 'vanished' is 13 years old, which is why I'm inclined to think it's simply given up the ghost.

zappaDPJ · Nov 27, 2020, 18:03:10

I would definitely try and remake the cable connections at both ends if at all possible. If that doesn't get it to appear in the BIOS then it's probably toast.

Simon · Nov 28, 2020, 01:05:37

Well, as I suspected, fiddling with the cables has made everything go from bad to worse. After I'd reconnected the cable to the failed drive, the PC wouldn't boot, saying 'BOOTMGR missing'. So, I reconnected everything again, including the main OS drive, and this time it booted, but only to the login screen, and then the keyboard wouldn't work to press enter to input the password.

So, I thought maybe something had changed in the BIOS, so somehow I managed to get into that, and although everything looked OK, I thought how can it hurt to enter the fail safe settings? So I did that and I think it must have disabled the pre-boot USB as now it won't boot again, and I can't get back into the BIOS to change anything as the USB keyboard won't work.

This always happens to me. A relatively minor thing turns into a bloody nightmare. Given that the PC is 13 years old, I'm thinking maybe it's time for a new one, but I don't know if I can face all the setting up and reinstalling of programs. I might try to find a PS2 keyboard and see if that will get me back into the BIOS, otherwise it will be a trip to the repair shop, when they open again.

robinc · Nov 28, 2020, 05:28:36

If you have access to another PC I would get a USB to SATA adapter - I use this one https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B01N2JIQR7/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1 and plug it in.

It would help eliminate any motherboard or related issues on the original machine.

Simon · Nov 28, 2020, 09:40:13

I think I know what I need to do at the moment, and that is to get a USB to PS2 adaptor so that I can plug in the keyboard and use it to get into the BIOS to reset the USB so its enabled during boot up. I'm not messing about with the SATA cables any more as that's what got me into the position I'm in now.

Clive · Nov 28, 2020, 11:39:58

Good luck Simon - hope you can get it sorted.

Simon · Nov 29, 2020, 17:45:55

Update: I found a PS2 keyboard in the garage (miraculously it was right at the top of a box on the top of a pile of boxes!), so I've managed to get into the BIOS and indeed, USB on boot was disabled, so I've now re-enabled that and all systems are go again, except the original problem with the 'missing' hard drive remains, so I'm drawing the conclusion that it's toast, and will await the new one to restore the backup to, which should be here by Wednesday.

nowster · Nov 30, 2020, 11:47:21

You can use GParted https://gparted.org/index.php to move partitions around on a hard drive, and expand them, once you've recovered the image to a fresh disk.

Simon · Nov 30, 2020, 12:22:06

From what I've read, when recovering a whole imaged disc with Acronis, you get the option to create / expand partitions during the process.

But not having done it before, and knowing that a full restore is likely to take about 15 hours (over 350Gb), I don't want to cock it up and have to start again, so I might just create the partitions in Windows when I install the new drive, then restore each one separately, if that would work. New drive is due to arrive on Wednesday.

zappaDPJ · Nov 30, 2020, 12:33:50

Simon · Dec 01, 2020, 18:09:16

The hard drive has arrived, so I've fitted it (bloody SATA connections!), partitioned it and Acronis now appears to be restoring the files. 5 hrs 55 mins remaining, which is a little bit of a.worry as it usually took much longer than that to do a full backup, but it says it's transferring 326Gb, which sounds about right, so we'll see what happens.

Simon · Dec 02, 2020, 18:07:47

It worked! Carry on...

Clive · Dec 03, 2020, 09:09:18

Fantastic Simon!

Simon · Dec 03, 2020, 16:44:38

I was very lucky in that the old hard drive must have failed immediately after a backup had been completed, as I haven't lost a thing.

It does make me wary of large capacity drives, though, as the more you have on them, the more there is to potentially lose, and this was with no warning whatsoever.

Simon · Dec 06, 2020, 19:10:02

I'm still having trouble with this, because of the bloody SATA connectors. Log story short, when I built this PC, about 13 years ago (I know!) the SATA connectors on the motherboard didn't have any casings so are just tiny bare pins that you have to delicately try to get the connector onto without bending them. This caused a huge amount of stress and frustration at the time, and now, I think from fiddling with the wiring while fitting the new hard drive, the connector to the main C drive is not secure, and I keep getting the message 'BOOTMGR missing' when I start the PC and I have to jiggle the wire on the hard drive, after which it works.

So, as I can't face the prospect of transferring and reinstalling everything onto a new PC, I had the brainwave of buying a PCIe SATA Card which is meant for expansion, but I'm hoping I can use it instead of the SATA connectors on the motherboard.

Can anyone see any problems with this?

zappaDPJ · Dec 06, 2020, 19:49:30

I think it'll work but only if your PC's BIOS supports UEFI.

My motherboard is also quite old and I have similar SATA connectors located directly under a monolithic 2 slot graphics card which I can't remove. They have had a truck load of abuse but I've never experienced connectivity issues.

When you jiggle the wire is the PC switched off and is it 100% consistent i.e. it never boots at first switch on?

Simon · Dec 06, 2020, 22:29:17

It's not consistent. The BOOTMGR missing error appears randomly (it's happened twice), so I power off and jiggle the SATA connection in the back of the hard drive, then reboot and it starts. I've not touched the connector at the motherboard end as that actually seems secure and I daren't disconnected it as I'd never be able to connect it again. The C drive is a new SSD, so I don't think the drive is at fault. It's possible the SATA cable is, but I can only find that out by disconnecting it.

zappaDPJ · Dec 06, 2020, 22:59:14

It does sound like a bad connection but I can't say I've encountered anything like that before. When I was ripping all my CDs I swapped the SATA cables between various CD drives to overcome copy protection and bad frame issues hundreds, if not thousands of times.

I thought from what was described you might have had a cold boot problem, especially as you reset the BIOS. It's still possibly I guess but unlikely. One test you could do is when the drive fails to boot don't touch the cable, press the reset button instead. If it does boot then the issue lies within your BIOS.

Simon · Dec 07, 2020, 00:14:20

I did wonder about the BIOS but the "BOOTMGR missing" issue occurred before I reset it, and was indeed the reason I did reset it.

I'm inclined to think that it may be the cable. There's no locking 'click' when the cable is connected, and it falls out of the SATA port on the hard drive at the slightest movement. Trouble is, I can't replace the cable without unplugging it at the motherboard end, and like I said, I doubt I'd be successful in connecting another one.

As I said before, this PC is 13 years old, but it's a bit like Trigger's broom. It's had several upgrades and when it runs, it runs perfectly. The other thing that stops me replacing it is the thought of having to set a new one up from scratch and reinstalling all the programs again. A decade or so ago I would have relished the prospect, but now I'm a grumpy old sod with an ever-growing hatred of new technology, I'd find it a tedious and unwelcome chore.

zappaDPJ · Dec 07, 2020, 00:26:36

I know the feeling. I need and can afford a new PC but the thought of having to install all the software I use is really off-putting.

Simon · Dec 07, 2020, 08:54:51

Funnily enough, I've just had a new Dell laptop delivered and can't be arsed to get it out of the box right now. My other laptop is 7 years old and runs like a sloth most of the time. Every time it grinds to a halt while I'm trying to do something and find I'm battling with yet another bloody Windows Update, I say I'm going to replace it, and now I have, of course, it's running like a dream.