Problem with s-ata harddisks and windows

[old.Gombur Glodson]

I just got a new comp.

MSI Neo-LSR mobo
GF4 ti-4200
1 Gig Kingston pc 3200 ram
P4 2,8 Ghz 800 Mhz FSB
2 x Seagate Barracuda V+, 120GB, SATA150 Harddisks

All and all a pretty nice comp if it wasnt for one thing:

I can install windows on it

I boot the winXP cd and run setup, I format my drive and then when its finished this message comes:

Setup was unable to format the partition disk may be damaged.

And I get that message when I try to install windows on both disks, so the odds that 2 completely new harddisks ere damage are kinda.....

I tried almost everything now and I really want to be able to use my new comp WITH windows.

Im open to any suggestions

 

[Scooba Da Bass]

Does your mobo support them? All I can think of is that your mobo can't handle them, unless your HDS shipped together and got a big bump in which case they both could be mashed.

 

[Deadmanwalking]

Try a standard ATA drive, if you get same prob then something on your mobo is stuffed.

 

[Embattle]

Did you use a SATA diskette to allow WIndows XP to properly see the drives?

 

[kameleon]

http://www.seagate.com/support/disc/drivers/discwiz.html

 

[old.Gombur Glodson]

Originally posted by kameleon
http://www.seagate.com/support/disc/drivers/discwiz.html

Used that program, windows setup gave the same error.

 

[(Shovel)]

Could you try setting up the partitions/formatting outside of windows setup and see if you can install onto a preformatted disk?

 

[xane]

Have you got the latest BIOS ?

 

[WPKenny]

Tried just one drive for starters?

I've got a SATA drive but just the one. I used the driver floppy no probs.

 

[old.Gombur Glodson]

It works perfectly fine with just one drive.

The disk with windows on is slave now and the other disk is master (naturally) cause otherwise windows would run very very slowly.

Problem now is that windows wont format the other drive (the one w/o windows)
I ran discwizzard, partitioned and formatted the drive, it said "disk has been succesfully partioned" ect

Though when I enter diskmanager, it doesnt list volume size for the drive or any volume name.
And when I format the drive via diskmanager it formats but when it finishes, it says: "windows was unable to format the disk"
Naturally I try to format to NTFS.

Really beats me whats wrong.

 

[old.Gombur Glodson]

Originally posted by xane
Have you got the latest BIOS ?

Bios is from march/april 2003, so fairly new.

 

[Testin da Cable]

try an fdisk /MBR on the recalcitrant disk mate