Help

[deathdawg]

i installed a second hard drive on a dell it worked just fine. then it froze so i shut it off i had to put the drive back in cuz i didnt install it so when i put it back in i bent a pin turned it on it didnt boot so i checked everything fixed pin and now all i get is press del to set up how do i fix? im a noob just so u know thanx

 

[deathdawg]

its windows xp by the way

 

[4745454b]

I am sorry for this post.

i installed a second hard drive on a dell

Good.

it worked just fine.

Glad to hear it.

then it froze

Bummer.

so i shut it off

Good idea.

i had to put the drive back in

Huh? When did you take it out?

cuz i didnt install it

Yes you did, in the first quote. You even used the word install.

so when i put it back in i bent a pin

On the drive?

turned it on

With a bent pin? WHY?

didnt boot

Duh.

so i checked everything fixed pin and now all i get is press del to set up how do i fix?

For the bios I'm assuming here. Can you get into the bios? Is the drive seen by the bios? Can you load the bios defaults and save/exit?

im a noob just so u know thanx

I think some of us have figured that out already. I'm sorry, I don't mean to be rude. Once you fix your computer problem you might want to check out this link.

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=when+to+use+a+period+in+a+sentence

 

[jsc]

And this is a 32 year old that should know better.

 

[deathdawg]

k First i didnt notice that i had bent the pin
yes it sees the hard drive bios and yes i can save defaults but still nothing

 

[4745454b]

I'm assuming (again) that you mean the bios sees the harddrive. Thats a good thing. More good as well that you can save the default values. What happens when you reboot? Does it still say you HAVE to enter the bios? Is there some way to skip that? Seeing as you said pins I'm assuming you have an IDE drive. If you have boot problems you probably have it jumpered wrong. Does it boot normally if you remove the new drive?

 

[deathdawg]

yes it says that i have to enter bios. no way to skip that i know of. yes i have an IDE drive. i have it jumped right i checked like 3 times. no it dose not boot normally when i remove drive. like i said it was working just fine then it froze, so i shut it off. when i turned it back on the (start in safe mode) screen came up so i hit enter on start windows normally and then it froze again. i checked all connections and jumpers, that is when i noticed the pin was bent so i fixed it. now when i turn it on i have to enter bios. i reset defaults and all that comes up is system setup.

 

[deathdawg]

so i rest defaults and set time. now i get boot disk failed and it wants me to put boot disk in drive a. how do i fix? i dont have a boot disk.

 

[branflakes71]

Is the second drive the one you want to boot from or are you still using the original drive?

Are the jumpers really set at master/slave properly? You may want to try cable select and make sure the ends of the cable are plugged in correctly. I know some HP's that use cable select, not master/slave for booting. May be the same on the Dell.

In the BIOS, check the boot order. Make sure it knows which hard drive you want to boot from.

 

[deathdawg]

yes i am using the original drive as master, yes the jumpers are set properly, yes the cables are correct. i have made sure the boot order is correct in BIOS.

 

[branflakes71]

Take the second drive out again and make sure to put everything back as originally was. In other words, go back to just the boot drive. Check the boot order in BIOS again and try to boot into SAFE MODE.

 

[deathdawg]

ive done that and it wants me to put in a boot disk in drive a

 

[4745454b]

Use a boot disk/cd or remove the original drive and see if there is any data on it.

 

[deathdawg]

Use a boot disk/cd or remove the original drive and see if there is any data on it.

would the boot disk be the windows xp cd? i dont have one. can i burn widows xp to a cd and use it? i have serial #.

 

[4745454b]

No, you need a real bootdisk. Try downloading the ultimate boot disk. It will boot from a CD, and give you more tools then you know what to do with. You'll need to know how to move around in DOS/unix for many of them.

If that sounds like to much, perhaps you can pull the main disk and put it in another computer? Perhaps a friends?

 

[branflakes71]

All I can say is either there is still a setting/jumper issue on your original drive, it has failed (reason it froze up), or there is such a corrupted file that Windows can't be booted to/detected.

Since your skill level is low, you may need to take it to someone to look at it.

Ultimate Boot Disk is a good idea, especially to at least look at the drive and see if all your major data is still there.

 

[deathdawg]

Thanx for all ur help