BleepingComputer.com: Hard Drive wont start

I recently was given the task of repairing a dell desktop from my office who's hard drive had crashed. I don't know much of the specs besides that has 2 gigs of ram, SATA connections with one IDE port, and a Intel Pentium D processor. I attempted to install one of my hard drives but without having one with a SATA connection I used the IDE cable connecting to the DVD drive and set the hard drive to Master. Once everything was set up I booted up the pc. the only thing that started up were the pc fans and the LED lights on the front of the tower. When I shut everything down I unplugged the IDE cord from the hard drive and started up the PC to see if the hard drive would boot up, it did. Now for some reason whenever either the hard drives or the DVD drive is connected to the IDE port on the motherboard they will not boot up. what am I doing wrong here?

This post has been edited by Will_L: 03 November 2011 - 05:56 PM

What about the monitor, any messages, beeps? Did you check the BIOS settings if the IDE drive is recognized together with the CD drive? Also changing the IDE mode or auto.

Connecting both the HDD and CD Drive on the same IDE controller means only one device can be accessed at a time.

Anyway, was the jumper setting for the CD drive set to Slave? have you checked the Master setting on the HDD?

Given that you are planning to repair the PC, why don't you just add a new SATA hard drive to the system and make use of the available SATA connections, leaving the IDE for the ODD?

Nothing displays on the monitor, no messages or beeps, I couldn't find a map on how to set the CD drive to slave but I have tried booting the pc without the CD drive connected to the IDE cable (so only the HDD was connected) and it still produced the same result, I set the HDD to master following the manufacturers’ instructions, and the reason I dont want to invest in a SATA hard drive is that I really have no use for this PC I'm just using it to brush up on my hardware troubleshooting while I study for my CompTIA exam and I just so happen to have 3 IDE HDD that I also have no use for. The main thing I cant understand is why the HDD and the CD drive can boot up while not connected to IDE but not while it is.

This post has been edited by Will_L: 04 November 2011 - 08:44 AM

Are you sure the given PC is still workable given the task at hand? There are Primary(for the hard drive) and Secondary(for optical drive) IDE Channel usually on Dell mobo. What model is the PC?

<<Connecting both the HDD and CD Drive on the same IDE controller means only one device can be accessed at a time.>>

Just a minor clarification...the more recent motherboards (last couple of years) which have only one IDE port...support the attachment/use of both a hard drive and the optical drive on the same IDE cable, with no problems.

Louis