slave drive error

[jr00d0]

I have a Vaio PCV-RS420.    Asus mobo with 2-320g WD hdd's.  Two days ago computer would not boot....giving me a "slave drive error" at boot  Press F2 to continue"   On doing so, I am taken to "bios setup utility" screen.   Here there are lines of strange figures running across a black screen; with the word "wait..." below.
   Not knowing what this was doing I stopped it.    I then went in and disconnected the second hdd, the machine boots normally.   I removed the drive and connected it externally to the maching using a ide to usb adapter.  The drive shows up in the bios, and the computer will start.   Opening the control panel the drive shows up as a "usb mass storage device" as it should with the adapter I am using, but it does NOT show up under "my computer", nor am I able to access it.   Machine eventually locks up and I have to re-start.

     I finally decided to let the above mentioned "bios setup utility" run, to see if that would help me.    So far it has been running for five hours.   Does anyone know what this is and what exactly it is doing AND how long should/will this take.

    This hdd contains all of my little one's fotos and videos.   I CANNOT lose this.   I know, I know.....shame on me for not backing up more.....I have learned my lesson GOOD this time.

Any help will be GREATLY appreciated.

[jttar]

Hello jr00d0,

Greetings and welcome.

Really sorry to hear about your situation. Although it is possible that the hard drive has failed I'm wondering if you have eliminated other possibilities. Heve you tried installing the "slave drive" as a "master" on the secondary IDE channel?
What is the configurment of your IDE channels? Do you have another computer to try this hard drive in to see if it is a problem with the operating system on your PCV-RS420?

Trying to help,
Joe

Joe

[jr00d0]

Yep, I tried on a both a Vista and a Windows 7 machine(original machine is an XP machine); both as slave and master on the second channel. In that case the machines did not get past the windows splash screen before locking up.
I guess I should have added that when it is connected using my ide adapter, it shows up in the bios, but not under "my computer" It also shows up in the device manager. I checked the properties there and it said the device was working properly, but under the volume tab I tried to populate the volume and it came up as unreadable, and unknown device.

I went to the disk manager in the administration tools and it showed up as an uninitialized disk, but it could not be accessed to be initialized.

thanx for that idea, though. I think I am about to turn it over to a Data recovery company...to see what they can do with it. the data is irreplaceable and quite precious to me.

[jttar]

jr00d0,

It does sound like you have tried everything possible and that the hard drive has gone bad. My best guess is that the Master Boot Record has been damaged. A data recovery company will probably be the safest way to retrieve the valuable info and pics on the drive.

Please do post back with how things work out.

Best of luck,
Joe