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A few days ago my computer wouldn't boot..said something along the lines of "Please insert correct boot media and press any key" Its oldish so I tried what I could and just went out to buy new hard drive.

Yesterday, installed it and it worked fine. Put Windows XP onto it and installed SP3 etc, turned on today and the same thing has happened! Tried changing cables, remove graphics card etc, restoring BIOS to default but nothing works.

Motherboard: Asus A8R32-MVP Deluxe
Ram: 2GB
HDD: 320gb Hitachi

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5 Answers 5

Reset to default
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Check your motherboard for bad caps. If you have good power and good cabling then the drive is bad.

Google Images http://images.google.com/images?q=bad%20caps

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This is what happens when you put windows on a different model of hard drive from the one it was originally installed on. Booting to your installation disk and telling it to repair the installation will get you back up and running in a jiffy, best of luck to you!

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  • When running Windows setup...I get "Windows cannot find any hard drives installed on the machine........." Thanks
    – Elliott
    Apr 26, 2010 at 18:43
  • This answer is not correct, based on Elliott's description of the problem. You can clone a hard drive onto a completely different model from a different manufacturer, without seeing the reported error.
    – rob
    Apr 26, 2010 at 19:28
  • That is not my experience...
    – marcusw
    Apr 27, 2010 at 2:13
  • @marcusw: The problem you're describing sounds different, like the boot loader was not installed when you installed the new hard drive. The only time that should happen is if you do a file-by-file copy or only clone the individual partitions (instead of a full disk clone), or if you also change your motherboard. But Elliott did a clean install on the new drive and everything was fine. Then the next day it failed again, even though he did not change any additional hardware. Windows installs the bootloader during installation, so something else must be wrong.
    – rob
    Apr 27, 2010 at 17:42
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Is the hard drive detected in BIOS? Is it free of malware? Can you connect it to a different system as a secondary drive (or put in an external enclosure) to test the drive and scan for malware?

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  • Its a brand new Hard Drive...I am using the one I bought yesterday, it worked fine now it doesnt.
    – Elliott
    Apr 26, 2010 at 19:03
  • Possibly it is bad as noted by others. It does happen. Possibly infected by something in the time it was working?
    – Dave M
    Apr 26, 2010 at 19:48
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It sounds like your hard drive may be defective. Try running chkdsk or badblocks, as noted here: Full physical hd check

If chkdsk or badblocks doesn't report any bad blocks, it's still possible that the drive is failing and the bad block scan triggered sector reallocations. You can install SmartMonTools + GSmartControl to view the SMART attributes. Once both tools are installed, run GSmartControl, double-click on your hard drive, then click on the Attributes tab. In particular, check the value for Reallocated Sector Count--on a brand-new drive, the raw value should be 0.

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  • I bought it from Pc World yesterday...it worked, now it doesnt?
    – Elliott
    Apr 26, 2010 at 19:18
  • I've had several brand-new hard drives come with bad blocks. I think if you run a bad block scan on your drive, it will either report bad blocks, or it will cause sectors to be reallocated, effectively hiding the bad blocks. A SMART diagnostics utility will tell you if the drive has reallocated sectors.
    – rob
    Apr 26, 2010 at 19:31
  • Tried this using live ubuntu disc and it doesnt pick it up?
    – Elliott
    Apr 26, 2010 at 19:54
  • edit...tried it in my computer (windows 7) and its found it..just scanning now.
    – Elliott
    Apr 26, 2010 at 20:03
  • This happened to me too: the same hard disk with different OSes was sometimes recognized and sometimes no. I thought that it was a matter of ATA vs SATA drivers: could it be?
    – dag729
    Apr 26, 2010 at 20:11
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Try to isolate the problem. Start with checking to make sure the boot order is correct. then take out your HD and hook to an enclosure to make sure drive works correctly. Then try switching the HD's power and data cables. If you're using a PATA check the jumper settings. If not might be problem with your motherboard. Also could be a problem with the Bootloader. Check for any error codes from the POST.

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  • Your answer would be better made as a comment and many of the options you mention the OP has already tried.
    – albal
    Aug 19, 2015 at 19:05

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