Help! Can't access hard drive!

Hi,

I'm currently stressed because I cannot access my hard drive which contains important data files. Here's what happened.

Our older computer is a NEC Ready 9510 model (Intel 180MHz MMX OverDrive Processor, 128MB 70pin EDO RAM, Windows 95A). It has two HDDs in it: the primary slave with 1.2GB capacity (Conner Peripherals) and a second HDD with 2.1GB capacity (Western Digital Caviar). The trouble began when I upgraded the computer to Windows 98SE. When I upgraded to Win98SE, at first things were smooth. I could access all the previously installed programs and I could retrieve data from both HDDs.

But since the speed was so slow, I decided to back up any important data on drive C: onto D:, format drive C: (which contained the Windows system files), and re-install Windows 98SE, hoping to get a clean start and a possible speed increase.

So, I did that and installed Windows98 directly on the formatted C: drive. The BIOS will boot and detect both HDD's and other components like the CD-ROM and Floppy drives. But, when I double-click on "My Computer," I only see the C: drive and not the D drive!! I only see the D: drive at the BIOS screen where it's correctly identified.

How can I use drive D again??


Thanks in advance

 

Is your slave drive selected to still be a slave.ie is the little black tab in the right place

 

Yes, the jumpers are correct and as is the cabling.

 

Hmm.. If you use a bootup disk, can you access the D drive from the command line?

D: <enter> [to switch to the D drive]
dir <enter> [to see a list of files and folders in the current location]

 

Per chance, since you say it's an older computer......do you have EZ-Bios or a similar overlay program on the drive that boots up...and probably had it on the drive that you reformatted, but failed to put the overlay program back on it?

When the main drive is booting up, hit the ESC key to see behind the splash screen....do you see anything regarding the bios being controlled by another program?

 

Is one hard drive on the primary IDE and the other on the secondary? If so make sure you have installed the drivers for the motherboard. Many times the secondary IDE will not be recognised until this is done.

Kate