anetanel wrote:

Hey guys. I got my hands on a sweet AMD 286-16Mhz pc. It came with an ISA "Super I/O Card" with an Acer M5105 A2 chip (picture a […]
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Hey guys.
I got my hands on a sweet AMD 286-16Mhz pc. It came with an ISA "Super I/O Card" with an Acer M5105 A2 chip (picture attached), but without an HDD.
I added a WD Caviar 2200, 212.3 MB HDD, and configured it in the BIOS according to the writing on the disc - but every time I boot, I get an error message: "fixed disk controller failure". I need to press F1 to continue booting from floppy, or F2 to enter BIOS.

I am able to boot from a Gotek floppy emulator, and once I'm in DOS (MS-DOS 5, if it matters), I can access the HDD without any problems.
I've partitioned the disc with FDISK, formatted it, copied files, games etc. and all seems to work without a hitch. But even though I've formatted with /s and I can see the system files, it still shows the above message and won't boot from the HDD.

I tried each of the 2 connectors on the IDE cable, replaced the IDE cable altogether, changed the card slot.. but no success.
Any help is appreciated 😀

Did you tried "fdisk /mbr"?

"fixed disk controller failure" is something you normally get with IDE when the CHS parameters are incorrect. Are you sure you have entered them correctly in the BIOS? Should be 958/12/34.

.legaCy wrote:

anetanel wrote:

Hey guys. I got my hands on a sweet AMD 286-16Mhz pc. It came with an ISA "Super I/O Card" with an Acer M5105 A2 chip (picture a […]
Show full quote

Hey guys.
I got my hands on a sweet AMD 286-16Mhz pc. It came with an ISA "Super I/O Card" with an Acer M5105 A2 chip (picture attached), but without an HDD.
I added a WD Caviar 2200, 212.3 MB HDD, and configured it in the BIOS according to the writing on the disc - but every time I boot, I get an error message: "fixed disk controller failure". I need to press F1 to continue booting from floppy, or F2 to enter BIOS.

I am able to boot from a Gotek floppy emulator, and once I'm in DOS (MS-DOS 5, if it matters), I can access the HDD without any problems.
I've partitioned the disc with FDISK, formatted it, copied files, games etc. and all seems to work without a hitch. But even though I've formatted with /s and I can see the system files, it still shows the above message and won't boot from the HDD.

I tried each of the 2 connectors on the IDE cable, replaced the IDE cable altogether, changed the card slot.. but no success.
Any help is appreciated 😀

Did you tried "fdisk /mbr"?

Tried now.. didn't change much.

derSammler wrote:

"fixed disk controller failure" is something you normally get with IDE when the CHS parameters are incorrect. Are you sure you have entered them correctly in the BIOS? Should be 958/12/34.

I am positive that I entered the correct parameters. But according to the writing on the disc, its 989/12/35. I tried the parameters you wrote, but I still got the same error.

derSammler wrote:

"fixed disk controller failure" is something you normally get with IDE when the CHS parameters are incorrect. Are you sure you have entered them correctly in the BIOS? Should be 958/12/34.

also, make sure the jumpers on the card are set correctly and the IDE is enabled, if not will display this error.

Me experience with old WD caviars is that you should just remove the jumper to set it to master. No matter what the sticker says.

Hi, I'm not sure what's the problem exactly, but as a least resort, you can give S0Kill a try.
It'll remove any spurious data at the beginning of the fixed disk. Whatever mixes up the boot process should be gone by then.
(But becareful: Before you do, please don't forget to backup any important data on that HDD.)

bloodbath2you wrote:

also, make sure the jumpers on the card are set correctly and the IDE is enabled, if not will display this error.

alvaro84 wrote:

Me experience with old WD caviars is that you should just remove the jumper to set it to master. No matter what the sticker says.

Thanks for the advice. I'll try to play with the jumpers.
I couldn't find any place to change IDE settings though.

Jo22 wrote:

Hi, I'm not sure what's the problem exactly, but as a least resort, you can give S0Kill a try.
It'll remove any spurious data at the beginning of the fixed disk. Whatever mixes up the boot process should be gone by then.
(But becareful: Before you do, please don't forget to backup any important data on that HDD.)

Thanks. I'll try that too. There's nothing on the disk that can't be restored rather easily 😀
It could be a bit of a hassle to copy it with floppies, but it may just be a good reason to try to find my old laptop with LPT port and use Norton Commander to copy files over the wire 😎

bloodbath2you wrote:

also, make sure the jumpers on the card are set correctly and the IDE is enabled, if not will display this error.

He can read the files on the HDD when booting from floppy. So IDE is surely enabled and jumpers are probably set correctly, too.

Yes agree, IDE configuration seems to be OK. The problem is with the BIOS setting. Can you make a screenshot what else can be adjusted?

Does your mainbaord have an additional onboard IDE?

What happens if you select "no disk" in the BIOS? Still the error message?

alvaro84 wrote:

Me experience with old WD caviars is that you should just remove the jumper to set it to master. No matter what the sticker says.

Dude! That worked!
I was sure (as others here) that since I can see the disk when booting from floppy, it is configured correctly.
Thank you very much.

I already ordered another IO card from Ebay 😜
I guess it doesn't hurt to have a spare...