Primary IDE - Any Way To Check It?

[Limerick]

Hi Folks,

I've recently built several systems using the MSI K7T Turbo2 board. These have served their owners well, and they have a great upgrade path so as to use up to an XP 2600+ chip, by simply flashing the BIOS to version 3.6.

My daughter has this mainboard in her home system, and it conked out all of a sudden. After a good bit of troubleshooting, I determined that the board was just flat dead, and since it was only a few months old, I RMAed it for another one. Got the replacement yesterday, and this morning put it together.

I've run into something that has me scratching my balding noggin. It appears that the IDE1 connector on the mainboard is dead. Nothing that I connect to it will work. I've cleared the CMOS and have tried two different hard drives that are known to work in other systems. I've tried several ribbon cables, but nothing (neither hard drives or CDs) are recognized on that connector. Conversely, the IDE2 connector is fine, and anything connected to it fires right up. If there is any way to check this for certain before I contact MSI to return it, I'm surely open to your ideas/suggestions. Thanks!

Happy Computing!

Limerick

[jenae]

Hi Limerick I lifted this from another forum might help:-
Logically if you can see another IDE device on the secondary Controller(let's say a CD drive for the purpose of example). then we know that the cable attached to the CD drive is functioning.
Also the Secondary controller on the MBD is working properly.
So now since we know the CD drive works fine on the secondary controller, Swap it(the CD-Drive, and it's IDE cable over to the Primary controller. If it is detected on the Primary controller then the MBD is not bad.

If that all works out fine for you, then a test for the HDD is to swap the Known good cable(from the CD drive) to the HDD, and check if the HDD is then detected. if not, BAD Hard Drive(HDD).

[Limerick]

Hi Jenae,

Many thanks for the response! The logic of what you offered is good, and was one of the things that I did before I posted. (Sorry that I didn't mention it.) The CD-ROM device, when set as Master on IDE2, is recognized by the BIOS, and works. Switching the ribbon cable over to IDE1 reveals that it is no longer recognized in the BIOS. Although I have the latest BIOS, I just now flashed it again "just for kicks" to see if I could get this thing to cooperate. But, alas! It didn't help.

I can only surmise that the circuitry to that part of the mainboard is amiss in some way. Still open to ideas here, though it looks like I'll have to wait out the course of swapping it for another one.

Limerick

[Train]

The only thing I can think of is a setting in BIOS that is disabling it. Have found that ability to do in a few mobo BIOS. Fact is I can do it with this board.

[Limerick]

Hi Train,

I appreciate your reply. I've gone through the BIOS several times, and I see a couple of settings here that fit that category:

OnChip IDE Channel0
OnChip IDE Channel1

They are both set to Enabled. In combing through the BIOS very closely, I see nothing else that would seem to determine whether that controller is enabled/disabled. Just to see if something was "wired backwards", I disabled the Channel0 mentioned above. But still no life detected on that channel.

In all of the tinkering that I've done with these beasts, I've not seen this issue before. I think I'll toss in the proverbial towel and see if I can get the board replaced. There must surely be something afoul with this one.

Limerick

[Train]

I would now.

looks like you covered all the bases.

[Limerick]

Howdy, Friends!

Boy, talk about being embarrassed! I did go ahead and RMA the board and got it replaced. I hooked it up last night and the same doggone thing happened, in that no device on the Primary controller was recognized.

So, just on the off chance that it was somehow a problem with the case, I pulled the board out of the case, placed it flat on my work bench, and hooked up a spare power supply to it. To my amazement, the hard drive on IDE0 was recognized! I then knew that something about the case was bound to be the culprit.

Now, don't laugh! I had previously had a different manufacturer's board in that case, and it needed an extra "standoff" mount. (Is that what they are called?) The metal kind that you squeeze together and then let it expand out in one of the pre-cut slots. And that was the problem! When I spotted it, I immediately knew that it was bound to be the problem. (It was located right under the Primary Controller, and was evidently shorting against the solder points that protrude down on the bottom side of the board.) I removed it, installed the board, and, bingo! I'm in business! I can't believe that I didn't see that little critter there weeks ago when I first installed the board that I subsequently RMAed. Well, I guess it's indeed true that we live and learn! OK, feel free to go ahead and have a good laugh at my expense now!

Limerick

[Train]

I just lucked out and barely caught a standoff that had to be removed yesterday myself. Gulp.

[jmtjet]

Don't feel bad-I've done it also.

[SuperSparks]

LOL Limerick.

Still, you got lucky in that it didn't cause any permanent damage to the mobo. I shall be building my new baby this weekend, now that the last bits have arrived, so I will learn from your mistake and be very careful with the standoffs.