Non-System Disk Nightmare

I have a Compaq Armada 1700 that originally had a 4 gig harddrive I just
recently purchased a used 20 gig harddrive and installed it. After
formating it and reinstalling the software it seemed to be alright. It
even restarted fine. But when I turned the power all the way off and
turned it on again I started getting 'non-system disk or disk error'.
suddenly the laptop would not see the harddrive. Once I installed the
old harddrive it booted up right away. Then I take the old harddrive
out and put the 20 gig back in THEN it boots up and behaves like
nothing has went wrong BUT once I shut the power all the way off again
and try to reboot it it gives me this 'NON-System..." mess again and
won't recognize it.

After consulting various forums and write ups i proceeded to update
the bios, rompaq, reformat, reinstall the harddrive, repartition, multi
partition, install the compaq diagnostic partition, install windows 2000
then XP. And after maintence check and over and over again after I shut
the PC down I get the same problem. I went into the BIOS and there is
no where to change the drive setting to 'AUTO DETECT'. Is there
something else about the compaq Armada that I am missing? Please help
me.

Its A Hobbee!


--
itsahobbee

It sounds like your problem may lie with the RTC (Real Time Clock)
battery. It may be flat and not maintaining you BIOS settings.

In article , itsahobbee
writes

I have a Compaq Armada 1700 that originally had a 4 gig harddrive I just
recently purchased a used 20 gig harddrive and installed it. After
formating it and reinstalling the software it seemed to be alright. It
even restarted fine. But when I turned the power all the way off and
turned it on again I started getting 'non-system disk or disk error'.
suddenly the laptop would not see the harddrive. Once I installed the
old harddrive it booted up right away. Then I take the old harddrive
out and put the 20 gig back in THEN it boots up and behaves like
nothing has went wrong BUT once I shut the power all the way off again
and try to reboot it it gives me this 'NON-System..." mess again and
won't recognize it.

After consulting various forums and write ups i proceeded to update
the bios, rompaq, reformat, reinstall the harddrive, repartition, multi
partition, install the compaq diagnostic partition, install windows 2000
then XP. And after maintence check and over and over again after I shut
the PC down I get the same problem. I went into the BIOS and there is
no where to change the drive setting to 'AUTO DETECT'. Is there
something else about the compaq Armada that I am missing? Please help
me.

Its A Hobbee!


--
itsahobbee

--
Nicholas David Richards -

"Où sont les neiges d'antan?"

are you sure that the used drive you bought is good?

did you replace the old drive because of space, or because you were
getting a similar error?