Secondary drive 0 not found - This is a tough one!

Ok, so I've been all over the internet now, trying to find a solution for this very annoying problem, but so far, nothing has helped! Nobody seems to have had the exact same symptoms as me either, just parts of them. Maybe I have a different problem all toghether, I don´t know..

This is my problem:
My D and E drives are missing.
They are installed, the lights are on and I can open them, but they don't show up in windows anywhere.

At startup I get the message:

Secondary drive 0 not found
Secondary drive 0 not found
Press F1 to continue or F2 to run setup

And setup says:

Secondary Master Drive 0 .... Unknown Device
Secondary Master Drive 1 .... Unknown Device

Problem history:
Everything was working fine, untill I decided to replace my CD-ROM with my new DVD-ROM, that had been successfully installed beneath my CD-ROM as "E:" prior to this. In other words, the drives are fully functional, but since I took them out and put them back in again, they suddenly can't be found.

What I've tried so far:
I've made sure that all cables are properly connected
I've upgraded my BIOS
I've done the "press ALT+E" procedure with Caps, Scroll and Numlock on.
I've deleted the "Upper-something" and "Lower-something" keys in regedit
I've disconnected every disconnectable cable inside my computer and put it back again after a few minutes
I've run virus and malware programs
I've searched the net with every key-word I could think of in hope of a solution, including "arrgghhh "

And I DON'T want to change the drivers back to their original position, because this is the way I'd like them and it's gonna work dammit!

Some system info:
I have a Dell Dimension 4600
BIOS version A12
Windows XP Home

So, you guys have any idea of what's up with this? A solution, a reason, anything? I would really appreciate your help!

 

If you rearranged your drives and ALSO changed their positions on the IDE cables then the first thing to do would be to make sure that the master/slave jumpers are set right.

For example: If origionally one IDE cable had the hard drive and one of the other drives on it and the other cable just had one of the other drives on it and you put both of the other drives on the same one and both were set to slave it's not gonna work. Also, use master/slave settings, not cable select.

 

Hi Jaylach!

Thank's for making this sound like a problem with a simple and logical solution, that is good news! Maybe that's why I haven't found the anwer out there already, because it's just basic knowledge?

Anyway, since I'm (obviously) a newbie when it comes to hardware-stuff, I'm still not sure what I'm expected to do next.

I'm assuming that the flat gray cables are the IDE ones, and the colorful traditional wires are the Master/Slave ones, am I right?

In either case, my hard-drive is connected to a completely different set of theese cables, so the drives I changed share their own set.

What I suppose I need to know more about now is this kinky Master/Slave relationship. Is it all in the cables, or do I have to change some setting in the setup after I start the computer?

The thing is, I find very few options to fiddle with in the setup mode, and I can't seem to find a lot of info about what's what in there.

"Secondary Master Drive" has only two options: Auto and Off. And neither seems to do any difference. Same goes with "Secondary Slave Drive ".
When I set them to Auto, they just say "Unknown Device ".

So, if you (or anyone) could be a bit more specific about what to select, and where to do it, I'm sure this will be solved right away! I'd really apreciate it!

Now I'm going to read up on "Cable Select ". Have no idea of what that is..

 

If ALL drives are connected as they origionally were in relation to the cables then it's probably not a master/slave problem but still worth checking to make sure it's not cable select.

You are right that the flat ones are the IDE. The 4 other colored wires are actually the power connection.

You don't set master/slave with any system settings. It is done on the drives themselves. On the same end as the ribbon cable you will see a shorter set of pins with a little plastic connector connecting two pins. There should be a diagram on the drive to show which pins to 'jumper' to set as master or slave. It will also show a setting for cable select. Cable select determins if master or slave by the position on the cable. I advise not to use cable select. A drive set as master is given primary use of the channel. A drive set as slave is given secondary usage. That is why it's usually best to set drives as follows...

Going with just the cable that the cds are on...

If you have one drive that burns and another that just reads always set the burner to master and the reader as slave. This gives the burner priority.

If you have a CD burner and a DVD burner set the DVD burner to Master and the CD burner to slave.

Now, if everything is set right and the problem is still there, unhook the ribbon cable and power cable from one of the drives and try it. Remember to be sure the system is off and unplugged. Try it with one drive and then the other. If one of the drives works and the other dosen't, it's probably a problem with the drive that dosen't.

 

Um.. Ok... Everything seems to work now, all of a sudden. Well allmost, at least...

I removed the CD-ROM, and left the DVD-ROM as master like before, but then it still just said "Secondary Master Drive - Unknown Device ", and said nothing about "Secondary Slave Drive ", just as expected.

Then I put in the CD as master, and the DVD as slave, and now everything works just fine!

I also confirmed that I don't have any cables at all to connect to the "Cable select" sockets, or the other ones. I just have two cables: The flat one and the colorful one.

I have an older computer also, which does have a third cable. This one goes to the Cable select/Master/Slave socket. Haven't checked which one, but it's working anyway so I'll leave it at that.

Speaking of my old computer by the way, that's the one who started this mess. What I really did was to take my CD-ROM from my new computer and put it in the old one. Then I took the old one's CD-ROM and put it in my new one, but at the same time I tried to put the DVD-ROM in the new computer as the master instead of the slave. So my plan was to change places on all three drives, but now I guess I can settle with having the DVD stay as the slave the way it was.

Or is this a bad idea? You adviced for the DVD to be the master, but would this be ok anyway? What would the complications be?

I'm still curious about what the problem really was? Or still would be, I suppose... It might be good to establish, just for the completion of this thread if nothing else. Do you have any clues or thoughts?

 

As long as they are CD ROM and DVD ROM and not burners it really dosen't matter as far as master/slave.

As long as it's working and all is cool we'll leave it at that.

 

Aha, ok.. but my DVD is a burner! And I should probably make this destinction in the future.. sorry!

So now what? Why can't a burner be slave?

And by the way, I really appreciate your devotion to help me! Thank you!

 

You say that the CDrom came from an older machine. I have found that some of the older ones just "prefer" to be jumpered as master.

The reason is probably that when they first came out, most computers had three places in which to put them (primary slave, secondary master or secondary slave), you will generally find that they were all set as secondary master and their "firmware" (the instructions on their information chip) were probably set that way. When CD-RW drives became available, they were set as slave to the original CDroms. I have come across CD-RWs that "prefer" to be set as slave. If the drive manufacturers have issued firmware updates it may have corrected this, otherwise you have to live in "Kinky Land" .

Matt

 

A burner CAN be a slave but it's best to have as master if possible. In your case this dosen't seem possible. The reason is that the master gets priority. If you are... say... burning on the burner and listening to a cd on the other then the burner could get a higher risk of failed burns. Just don't listen to music while burning!

 

Wow, history lesson and all, this is a great forum!

Yep, the old drive is manufactured in 98, and apparently that's old enough. Can't mess with the seniors, hehe.. I just installed it because I didn't want it laying around collecting dust anyway, so I guess I'll be fine.

So, both computers are working, burnig capabilities and all.. This is great! I have been struggling with this for three days straight now, so a big THANKS to you guys!

Now I'm off to burn Constantine. Thanks again, have a great day!

 

If I was burning something "on the fly" (which means burning from one drive to another) I think I would prefer jaylach's setup, where the more modern drive is master.
I don't burn "on the fly ", I use "copy to file ". There is too much chance of something going wrong. If you are using an older CDrom, it may be better to use "copy to file" anyway.

Just found that jaylach has replied (above), yes, don't do any "multitasking" while burning. Go off and wash the car. No kinky stuff.

Look around here:
www.cdmediaworld.com

Matt

 

Cable Select/Master/Slave does not use a cable, just a jumper, which is a small plastic "thingy" (connector) that creates a circuit between two pins. If you have no jumpers on the drives, it could be a conflict between the two is causing the problem. This is not unheard of. I had a similar problem when I moved all drives to a new motherboard. The configuration was exactly the same as in the previous system and it would not run at all. I thought I had a RAM problem, but when I swapped out one of the CDROMs for a new CD writer everything was fine.

Setting a jumpers as DVD - Master and CD - Slave may solve this dilema. Since the DVD is newer and no doubt faster, it would be preferrable to have it as the master device. All communication on the chain goes through the master device.

DRD

 

Small plastic "thingy ". That's defenetly more helpful than "jumper "!
Yes, I think I saw something like that, but I didn't know you could remove it. Thanks for the info, this is really useful stuff! Sometimes I wish manuals would refer to "thingies" and "cleverly hidden" and so on. That would make me read them, at least..