Got pc from freind all it needed was hard drive! fitted western digital 400gb ide, set jumper to master & connected hd to end of ribbon.Set bios to default & it detected hd & cd roms,when i hit delete to setup it reported that no devices detected.
Any help would be appreciated.
Motherboard Asus AI p4p800
pentium 4.

Are you very sure that it your IDE is set to Master? There might be a conflict with your Optical Drive. So better check it. Set CD/DVD to slave.

Then replug it again. Also, try other IDE cables.

MYK thanks for reply,
HD is in ide slot 1 and set to master,which makes it primary master?
cd roms in ide slot 2 and set to master and slave,which makes them secoundary master and secoundary slave? is this correct.
regards hobgoblin.

MYK thanks for reply,
HD is in ide slot 1 and set to master,which makes it primary master?
cd roms in ide slot 2 and set to master and slave,which makes them secoundary master and secoundary slave? is this correct.
regards hobgoblin.

no
master/slave is when you use same cable and slot

try to set cable select

Hi,i have set hd to cable select now.
Replaced both ide cables.
Ide slot 1 on motherboard connected to hd on end connection and jumper set to cable select.
Ide slot 2 on motherboard connected to cd rom 1 and cd rom 2, cd rom 1 set to master and cd rom 2 set to slave.
Bios auto detects all drives etc but on next screen reports no device for primary master or secoundary,next screen requests insert proper boot media?
Regards hobgoblin.
ps power supply ok,

if drives are properly detected ist ok
wich one is master or slave doesnt matter

now go to boot section
look for
a disks or devices or something
b boot priorety or equence or something

[ most bioss are different so i cant tell exactly ]
good sequense

floppy
harddisk
cd rom
other

Try to plug only the Hard disk. When it work & boot, plug 1 optcal drve then try again. Do it again to 2nd opcal drve.

it cannot boot
there is no os on a new harddisk

first disks & bios must be setup

Basfit you sorted it,os of course.
The system was looking for some media to run,i had put the os disk in cd rom drive 1 previously and it looked as though the drive was running but it still came up with no device! After what basfit wrote i put the disk in drive 2 and set bios to boot from that disk and it started to load vista.
Nice one guys much appreciated, first time i had seen inside a computer was 4 days ago & this has learnt me a lot.
Regards hobgoblin.

great
and next time you do it
touch a waterline before you start
or you can buy a new disk again

Your problem has been solved

:close: