New
#1
Fearing fried i/o on MB. Failing to access non system drives. 64bit
The situation:
My motherboard has 3 sata inputs. In them was:
I have my windows 7 installation, along with several other core applications installed on my SSD 120 gig drive. I have games and other non-daily applications on a 7200rpm terabyte drive. Lastly, I have a dvd drive.
This setup has served me well for nearly a year.
I'd like to note that I have replaced the SATA cables in this system a number of times. (4+)
Suddenly, the connection to the terabyte drive is dropped. As has been the case in the past, I assume it's the SATA cable. Upon replacing it the system started up, but would not give me legitimate access to the terabyte drive. To be clear, the drive showed up, the files populated the explorer, but an attempt to open a file resulted in a 'not responding' type of reaction from the related explorer window.
What I tried:
I tried unplugging all but system SSD. the system starts as normal, quickly with no errors.
I tried plugging ONLY the system SSD and the DVD drive. Uh-Oh. The dvd drive showed up in the explorer, but an attempt to access the disc resulted in a long 'not responding' type of reaction. The device manager shows that the drive is present, but will not uninstall it or open its properties. Attempting to do either results in a similar non-response/system slowdown.
After this I tried to BOOT from the dvd drive.. just to make sure that my problem is in Windows and not elsewhere. The drive shows up in boot options.. but when I attempt to boot from the dvd drive, I get a non-response period followed by a loss of the drive connection altogether. Each new attempt gives the same results.
I decided to try to boot up from the system SSD drive WITH ONLY it and the terabyte drive connected. System stuck at windows startup.
I tried to hotplug the terabyte drive after booting from only the SSD drive. This game me temporary access to the terabyte drive in explorer, but ultimately resulted in the same issue of not having legitimate access to the drive. Trying to shutdown the system resulted in system lock at 'logging out'.
To describe the environment a little: 2/3 sata cables are new. the ssd cable hasnt been touched.
i was playing battlefield 3 when this all began. I've not have battlefield 3 installed for very long, and it seems to be a real system hog in every way. I suspect that it's related, but hate to appear noobish in such presumptions.
Folllowing the fact that the dvd drive won't boot the system AND the terabyte drive gives a similar bios response, im led to no other conclusion than that my motherboard has a problem. This is where my limited knowledge is completely blackened. What the hell is wrong with my box?
I have NOT moved the connection to the SSD drive in any way during this troubleshooting. it remains in the top motherboard slot and continues to boot up properly when left as the only connection to be plugged in.
Thanks for reading.. and any advice is appreciated.