Your are right,in that you can't do anything to a drive that is not recognized in BIOS.

If the voltage to the drive is correct and the drive runs (power supply problem)than the porblem is in the controller circuit.

Also, I can't see how successive formats can ruin a drive-- altho, a failed linix setup can cause a lot of headaches and perhaps this is true with a NTFS file system.

Can the drive be recognized with the WD floppy set up disk that bypasses the system BIOS?
And by the way, if the drive is less than a year old it's probably still under warranty.

And lastly, have you tried it in another system?
mike michel
---------------------------------------------------------
 --- On Wed 11/05/03, Ian < [log in to unmask] > wrote:
Subject: [PCBUILD] Second-to-last rites for a hard drive?

Thanks to all who commented on my problem with a suddenly unrecognised hard drive. Many of you seemed to think that variations of FDisk switches or similar applications might do the trick, but I can't see how one can apply ANY treatment to a drive that isn't being seen by the computer in the BIOS or in DOS. However, I might try Mark's suggestion and try it with a different ribbon on another IDE port with different jumper combinations.
Ian Porter

 ----- Original Message ---From: Ian
Subject: Re: [PCBUILD] Second-to-last rites for a hard drive?
I seem to have killed a 3\4 year old Western Digital 3gb hard drive and I'm wondering if there's any way I can resurrect it.                 >

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