Adding a new hard disk....

[Srikanth Krishna]

Hi,

I have an HP Pavilion 7360 with a 3.8 GB hard disk housed in the 5.25" bay. I'm trying to add a new 120 GB Hard disk (Western Digital, 7200 RPM).

I would like to know which one I should have as the master - should it be the new one, since it's faster & bigger? In that case, how should I set the jumper settings on my current hard disk so that it becomes the slave?

How do I get into the BIOS/CMOS setup, and what changes should I make there before/after the upgrade?

I have NEVER attempted a hard disk upgrade before, so any input would be appreciated!

[Jon Mattatall]

Ummmmm....
Good News and Bad News.

Good - Adding a hard drive is not that tough. The bus is EIDE.

Bad - The 7360's BIOS may not recognize your new disk. The maximum size may show up as 8.4GB or so.

There is a BIOS update available here:

http://www.hp.com/cposupport/swindexes/pv7360_swen.html

But it says nothing about large drives.

Check your BIOS settings as here

http://www.hp.com/cposupport/personal_computing/support_doc/bph03516.html

IF (and I do mean IF) the drive will work in your system, the fastest drive (all things being equal) is generally configured as master.
In practice, I believe that unless you put them on individual controllers, they'll both operate at the slower speed (Likely ATA66 rather than ATA100).

Some folks have worked around the size limitations with programs from the disk manufacturer - look at this thread:

http://forums.itrc.hp.com/cm/QuestionAnswer/1,,0x62c6c8ecad09d6118ff40090279cd0f9,00.html

or search the forums for others like it.

Maxtor offers something called Maxblast Disk Manager for this.

This covers adding a disk:

http://www.hp.com/cposupport/personal_computing/support_doc/bph03792.html

and this should be the pinout for your WD jumpers:

http://www.westerndigital.com/products/current/retailkits/wd1200bbrtl.asp

I don't know what's in the 7360, so you may have to dig around in the original documents if you have them.

And finally, go with master/slave. The 7360 may not support Cable Select (CS)

http://www.firmware.com/support/bios/cablesel.htm

HTH

Jon

[Srikanth Krishna]

Hi Jon,

Thank you for your response. I got to some of the hyperlinks you've mentioned, and gathered some information that I didn't have before. A colleague was also telling me that I might have to use a new controller for the new hard disk.

I changed my mind about upgrading the 7360, as it seems to be too much of a pain. It's a very old machine that obviously wasn't designed to handle a bigger payload:-)

I ran into another problem when I tried to get the 7360 working the way it was, with the older hard disk. After I removed the
new disk (120GB) and attached the IDE cable and power supply to the old one, it is not being recognized now!! i.e., when I go into CMOS Setup, I see 'Primary IDE not installed'. I tried setting it to AutoDetect, but that didn't help.

I got the old disk's configuration from the HP site. Do you think entering the settings manually (heads, cylinders, sectors etc.) will help the system recognize the disk?


Thanks
Srikanth

[Jon Mattatall]

Hi there....

It seems silly, but are you sure you:
a) Put the jumper back to the Primary position?
b) Used the proper connector on the IDE cable?

Entering the settings manually was mainly used as a workaround years ago when disks were changing faster than BIOS. Heads, sectors, etc., could vary in some cases.

So, the most likely problem is that you put it back together with some connector/setting changed. Autodetect should pick it up.

If you DO confirm all connections/cables correct and tight, it probably couldn't hurt to manually enter the settings. The absolute worst case scenario is that your drive has picked this moment to die, but check the cabling and jumpers first.

Jon

[Srikanth Krishna]

Hi Jon,

That was fast - thanks!

1) Jumper settings - I did not change it the first time around (i.e., when I installed the 120 GB Hard disk); I had pulled out the IDE connector & power supply from the old one. So the old one still has the original jumper settings - I guess I could rule that out...

2) Proper connector on the IDE cable - I'm not sure what you mean by this...I made sure that I was not trying to force the connector upside down or something. Is this what you mean, or is it something else...?

And by the way, AutoDetect DID pick it up the first time around (when I had the PC open). I thought the problem was solved, and closed the box when I found that I could log on. That's when the problem arose...i.e., I got the error message 'Primary IDE not installed'. So for some reason (maybe a loose connection or something??) it wouldn't boot up.

I'll keep trying...:-)

[Milla_1]

Did you check the IDE cable from the other end?? From the motherboards end?? If it's little loose, BIOS won't find the disk!