PC freezes on start up when hard drive is attached.

Factual Questions
1

Today when I started the computer I noticed that XP does not show my internal 500GB hard drive. I shut down the computer, opened the case and checked if one of the cables got loose. Now when I try to start the PC it freezes before I can even get to BIOS. If I remove the HD, the computer boots up normally. The last thing the computer posts is “Detecting IDE drives”(paraphrased) before it freezes. The last post code on the motherboard is 75: “Detect & install all IDE devices: HDD, LS120, ZIP, CDROM …”

I’ve replaced the SATA cable but that didn’t work. I also tried to connect the SATA cable to a different SATA connector, but that didn’t help either.
My motherboard is a Abit IP35 Pro XE ATX with a Core 2 Duo E8500
The hard drive is a Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 500 GB SATA 3.0 Gbit/s
I’m running Windows XP SP3

Is my HD broken? It’s still under warranty so replacing it shouldn’t be a problem. I use the HD for gaming, and it contains no critical information that I need to save.

Edit: The computer doesn’t totally freeze. I can still reboot by pressing Ctrl + Alt + Del.

Any help would be appreciated.

2

This is looking ominous. Try putting the HDD on a different power lead. One that’s different all the way back to the PSU.

Failing that, put your ear near to it: does the HDD actually spin up? Does it get warm?

3

Also you might want to try moving the supposedly bad hard drive to a different computer and see what happens.

4

Tried this and computer still freezed. The primary HDD works with the power lead that was attached to the secondary.

As far I can tell, the HDD starts to spin. I can hear the typical HDD sounds and I can feel it vibrating when I put my finger on it.

I’ll have to try that. Thanks.

5

I had a problem like this when I was upgrading one of my hard drives. Thought I killed the power supply at first. What I wound up doing was finding the CMOS reset jumper and doing that procedure a couple times, that fixed it.

6

With the hard drive unplugged so you can get to the BIOS, make sure it the interface is set for “IDE” or “AHCI” or whatever it’s supposed to be.

Also make sure the boot order is correct. Sometimes plugging in a USB thumb drive or USB DVD burner will re-arrange the boot order in the BIOS.

7

Tried that, no result I’m afraid.

It was originally set to “IDE”. I changed it to AHCI and got as far as the “starting Windows XP” screen before the computer rebooted itself. Didn’t get to BIOS either. As for the boot order, I’m not sure what would be the correct order.

8

Usually you want to put whatever your emergency boot would be first (e.g., a floppy or CD/DVD drive, so that you can boot from a 3.5 disk or CD if your boot drive is fried), then your main boot drive. Make sure that the computer isn’t trying to boot from this other HDD.

9

That drive has known problems. There is a firmware update available from Seagate; don’t know if it is too late after it crashes.

10

Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 drives failing

Seems to me I’m shit outta luck. Well at least the drive contained nothing important, but it’s going to be pain to reinstall all the games.