Does anyone here know what they are talking about? Any techies?

Does anyone here know what they are talking about? Any techies?

Not trying to be a jerk, but I previously posted a question (twice) and all I have gotten are responses that either a) tell me to do what I stated I have already tried to do, or b) give me a self-indulgent epiphany on computer systems and terminology.

I would greatly appreciate any focused and objective help regarding the following:

I have a Sony Vaio VGN-S360 and just replaced the hard drive. When I try to install the operating system I get the message "invalid system disk." I have tried to access BIOS with no luck. It is a Phoenix BIOS and from doing an internet search it appears the key to access is either F1, F2, or F3. I have tried each with no success. I have also tried esc, del, etc. Is there something I am not doing, or need to do, after installing the hard drive to allow access to the BIOS?

The hard drive won't keep you from accessing the bios, or it shouldn't. The Power On Self Test screen should be the first thing you see after powering on your machine. At this point, it should be testing the memory and looking to see what drives are attached. This is when you should be able to enter the bios. I've seen tab, f8, or any number of other options to enter bios. Del and esc are common.

The hard drive is usually accessed right after the POST is finished, unless the system has been configured to access another drive first. (cd rom, floppy, etc)

We will need to have more info to help.

Try formatting the drive with a gparted live cd first. http://gparted.sourceforge.net/livecd.php .

Or try partitioning it with cfdisk off of a liveCD.

Hope this helps!

Edit: fixed link

If you don't plan on installing XP or Vista use gparted, if that doesn't work your hard drive is toast.