PC not recognising second hard drive

[The Pink Ninja]

PC is booting from a Western Digital Drive running Windows 7

A Samusung drive I hope has nothing on it is also plugged in

When I go to My Computer it doesn't recognise the Samsung as being there.

However when I right click > properties > Hardware I can see the samsung drive alongside the western digital drive and the DVD drive. Likewise, device manager also sees them both.

What do?

(Or in English, how do I get the PC to recognise the Samsung Drive?)

I can;t install Win7 on the Samsung because the reason I want it to show on my computer is so I can right click > Format and install win7

...

My PC is very sick

[db1331]

I've seen an HDD not show up under My Computer because it is sharing a drive letter with something, like a card reader or USB key. Have you tried changing the drive letter under Device Manager?

[Quinnbeast]

My guess is, you haven't set up a partition on the Samsung drive yet. File manager won't recognise it because there is no functional file system on it (NTFS, FAT32 etc), but it's recognised under device manager because it's connected.

If you do a search for "Disk Management Win7" in google, you'll find some useful links, such as:

http://pcsupport.about.com/od/window...-windows-7.htm

Disk manager should let you format/partition the new drive ready for use. However, if you wish to install Win7 on the new drive, then just plug it in as the primary (disconnect the WD first to ensure you don't harm any data on it), and run through a fresh install with a Win7 boot DVD.

[The Pink Ninja]

Problem solved, thanks guys.

[Skull]

Ahh shit, I wish I'd seen this thread earlier, I'm having similar issues but my problems a little different. I just bought a brand new hdd, its exactly the same make and model as I currently have and I just want to back up my files on it so I could format the original.

I connected my new hdd to the motherboard and the PSU (although this didn't feel as though it fit as nicely as my other hdd, the PSU cable kept coming loose as I tried to get the hdd into position, it was also running off the same cable as my original hdd, don't know if this makes a difference but wanted to point it out). I booted Windows and everything seemed to work fine apart from it wouldn't show the drive in My Computer. In retrospect I should have come here right away, but me thinking I knew what I was doing, assumed the PSU connector had slipped off again.

So I wen't into BIOS and I still couldn't find the drive. I think I looked into opening up a "second boot option" and it wasn't listed. So I turned off my PC checked the connections and tried again. This time I was stuck on the first screen that told my what motherboard I was using, nothing seemed to be loading and trying to get it to go into BIOS wasn't happening either.

After around 10 mins of it hanging on this screen it went into BIOS on it's own and I went back to look into the boot options (taking it out of BIOS just restarted the PC and led me into the same situation). I had managed to set my second boot option to launch from my external drive whilst the first was my original drive. Feeling quite daft, I disable the second boot option and tried again to....no avail.

Anyways it seems to work after I disconnected my external drive and my new drive now. So I guess my question is...what the hell am I doing wrong!? I don't really want to mess around inside the innards of my computer and break shit again on a week night. I thought it would be a simple case of plug in new hdd and it'll work :P. Guess nothings that simple. So from the sounds of my problem, what Quinnbeast suggested would work right?

[Skull]

ok guys just a quick update. Seems to all be working now by following the guide quinnbeast linked too. My PC will boot with my external drive connected as well so that's good :).

Only downside is I have worked out why the connector is a bit dodgy, a bit of plastic that runs along it had come loose somehow and wasn't holding it in place properly, hence why it fitted but slipped off so easy. Unfortunately all the other ports on my PSU are these 4 pin ones that don't get used. I will need to find a electronics shop and find some converters so they will fit my standard looking hdd.