Resolved Install XP can't find hard drive

I recently inherited an XP desktop from a small biz and was asked to format and
reinstall. XP does boot up, however when I insert the XP full CD to reformat
it tells me it can't find the hard drive and aborts. As soon as I remove the CD
XP will boot up to the "enter password" screen. I have tried several different
versions of Win XP Pro full and none of them can locate the hard drive.
Not sure if this is a hardware problem or...am I just missing something?
Suggestions..?

 

Go into the BIOS at startup and look for the setting for the SATA Controller. Turn off the setting of AHCI (it might be Disabled or something like Compatibility).

 

I should have stated in my original post that the drive is indeed SATA and I tried two
levels of XP. 1 was SP-2 and the other was an old XP Pro w/no SP's installed. I'll borrow an SP-3 level today and try to format. Also I'll get a chance to look at the BIOS at bootup later today. Thanks again for the hints..

 

If you have an SP-2 CD you could create your own SP3 cd using the following instructions...

Slipstreaming Windows XP Service Pack 3 and Create Bootable CD

 

Re. "Go into the BIOS at startup and look for the setting for the SATA Controller. "
What I see is... Phoenix - AwardBIOS CMOS Setup. The options are..
Std. CMOS features
Adv. BIOS Feats.
Adv. Chipset Feats.
Integrated Peripherals
PnP/PCI Config.
H/W Monitor

I briefly went through each of those and did not see "setting of AHCI "

 

It should be (buried) under Integrated Peripherals. Have a look at this
http://www.computerhope.com/help/phoenixa.htm
See under Integrated Peripherals that some listings have Press Enter, you highlight the listing and press the Enter key to see the sub-menu.

 

Under Integrated Peripherals, there is a VIA OnChip Device. Under which is:
OnChip SATA [Enabled]
SATA Mode [RAID]
those are the only references to SATA I see.

 

You need two or more Hard Disk Drives to run RAID. You are not trying to run RAID are you? If not, change the SATA Mode setting. I couldn't guess what options it will have. If it has Compatibility, choose that.

 

After changing the SATA from [RAID] to [IDE] (the only other option). I now see
"Warning the boot devices have been changed "
"BBS boot priority will be affected. Please enter SETUP to change "
I'm not sure where to go from here.

 

Enter SETUP means to go into the BIOS (you probably know). Look at the "Boot Priority" settings. They may not have have changed. Is the HDD still listed (and the CD/DVD)? Have you tried running the Windows installation again? Will it see the HDD now?

You will need to get the system/motherboard manual or service manual to find the difference between "RAID" and "IDE ", but if you are not setting up a RAID configuration, I expect you need to set it to IDE (note that it is a SATA Mode).

Matt