Dell Inspiron 1525 - Internal hard disk drive not found

Question

I have a Dell Inspiron 1525 laptop and every now and then it is shut down for no reason with this message on the screen:

internal hard disk drive not found
To resolve this issue, try to reseat the drive.

No bootable devices--strike F1 to retry boot, F2 for setup utility
Press F5 to run onboard diagnostics.

If I just restart the computer it will boot up without problems. This happens about twice a day and it looks like it only happens when the computer has been idle for a few minutes.

I have already tried to reseated the drive, ran the onboard diagnostics and there were no errors.

Any ideas?

Answer 1

Sounds like one of 2 possibilities:

1. Your HD is about to crock - make sure you have a full backup of your valuables. To test this, try putting in a different HD (if you have one).
2. The SATA (it is SATA on the 1525, not IDE, right?) connector has a broken contact or another problem. Again, this can be verified with another HD.

Answer 2

I have done some tests and figured that this only happens when the computer goes to sleep or hibernates. This is probably not related to the HD.

When I hit the sleep button in Windows the computer looks like it's going into Sleep mode but a few seconds later it's restarted, and stops with the error message above.

The computer is running Windows Vista (SP2) and I have installed all available Windows Updates and the latest manufacturer drivers.

I have changed the power settings for all devices where it's available so that they are not allowed to wake up the computer.

Answer 3

I have finally found the solution. The problem was caused by the Broadcom Wireless Network Adapter in my Dell Inspiron 1525.

Here's what I did:

1. Start
2. Control Panel
3. Device Manager
4. Expand "Network adapters"
5. Double-click "Broadcom 802.11g Network Adapter"
6. Click "Advanced"
7. Select "Wake-Up Mode" from the list
8. Change the value to "None"

Answer 4

It happened to my inspirin 1525. I contacted Dell and they said directly that its a hardware failure. As mine was not under warranty i had to buy another Harddisk