I
ian
My Dell Inspiron 8100 has an annoying habit. Whenever I turn the laptop off
and carry it back from my office to the house (100 yards, very carefully)
the chances are that I then get the start up message "No fixed disks or
optical drives detected - Press F1" or something like that. It then beeps
every time it tries to refresh the drive list and fails.
I therefore put in a new drive, and it is also doing the same thing again
now.
I usually pull the hard drive out, put it back in a few times, and then it
works fine. But it is a pain in a "portable" device to have to do that.
Do you think that the hard drive has a problem (I don't).
Will reseating connectors in the laptop help - because I am leary about
taking it all apart - especially in mid-winter with static about.
Is this peculiar to Dell? I have seen many other posts on this issue, but no
satisfactory resolution in any of them.
I can carry the computer about with the power on, and no adverse effect. But
if I turn it off - that is when the problem surfaces. Is there a CMOS
battery in the Dell that I should replace? (The main battery is new.) If so,
where is it? Any thoughts from anyone would be most welcome.
Many thanks, Ian
PS. OS is Win 2000 Pro (SP4) with all current updates etc. No viruses. This
problem happens as soon as it finishes the Dell init - I hear a clicking as
it fails to recognize the drive. Then all of a sudden it will.
I have cleaned the drive connector. No other errors of any kind are reported
during operation of the machine. Machine is about 5 years old. Hard disk one
year old. Normally runs fine if I don't move it. When it does start, no
errors are reported.
and carry it back from my office to the house (100 yards, very carefully)
the chances are that I then get the start up message "No fixed disks or
optical drives detected - Press F1" or something like that. It then beeps
every time it tries to refresh the drive list and fails.
I therefore put in a new drive, and it is also doing the same thing again
now.
I usually pull the hard drive out, put it back in a few times, and then it
works fine. But it is a pain in a "portable" device to have to do that.
Do you think that the hard drive has a problem (I don't).
Will reseating connectors in the laptop help - because I am leary about
taking it all apart - especially in mid-winter with static about.
Is this peculiar to Dell? I have seen many other posts on this issue, but no
satisfactory resolution in any of them.
I can carry the computer about with the power on, and no adverse effect. But
if I turn it off - that is when the problem surfaces. Is there a CMOS
battery in the Dell that I should replace? (The main battery is new.) If so,
where is it? Any thoughts from anyone would be most welcome.
Many thanks, Ian
PS. OS is Win 2000 Pro (SP4) with all current updates etc. No viruses. This
problem happens as soon as it finishes the Dell init - I hear a clicking as
it fails to recognize the drive. Then all of a sudden it will.
I have cleaned the drive connector. No other errors of any kind are reported
during operation of the machine. Machine is about 5 years old. Hard disk one
year old. Normally runs fine if I don't move it. When it does start, no
errors are reported.