New Hard Disk for Pentium II PC

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January 18, 2007 at 1:51 am #2252187

New Hard Disk for Pentium II PC

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by pwadhwa · about 18 years, 3 months ago

I just purchased an 80GB Seagate ATA 100 drive for an old Pentium II PC. However, when I connect the hard disk to the computer and boot it up, the BIOS tries to recognise it but nothing happens. I have set the CMOS option for Primary Master disk to AUTO with LBA mode enabled. The jumpers are also set to Master on the hard disk.

It currently has 2 x 8GB hard disk and a CD ROM drive.

Do I need to upgrade the BIOS?
or Do I need to buy a PCI IDE Card to connect my new Hard disk? If I need a new PCI card, do I need one which is PCI 2.1 compliant or are they backward compatible as well?

Any help would be much appreciated.
Thanks

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- January 18, 2007 at 1:51 am #2490554
  
  Clarifications
  
  by pwadhwa · about 18 years, 3 months ago
  
  In reply to New Hard Disk for Pentium II PC
  
  Clarifications
- January 18, 2007 at 2:58 am #2493038
  
  Max 32GB?
  
  by toivo talikka · about 18 years, 3 months ago
  
  In reply to New Hard Disk for Pentium II PC
  
  Depending on the motherboard, it may be limited to recognising the hard drive only if you have strapped the jumper which limits it to 32GB.
  - January 18, 2007 at 3:16 am #2493032
    
    Max 32GB?
    
    by pwadhwa · about 18 years, 3 months ago
    
    In reply to Max 32GB?
    
    Will give it a try tonight. Thanks for the tip.
    
    However, if it doesnt work, do you think buying a PCI card would be the solution?
    
    Cheers
- January 18, 2007 at 3:22 am #2493030
  
  sounds like….
  
  by jamesatmaisonverre · about 18 years, 3 months ago
  
  In reply to New Hard Disk for Pentium II PC
  
  a bios upgrade if you can get one
- January 18, 2007 at 5:17 am #2493000
  
  This depends on the M’Boards BIOS
  
  by hal 9000 · about 18 years, 3 months ago
  
  In reply to New Hard Disk for Pentium II PC
  
  Most of the latter P2’s with the latest BIOS Update would only accept up to a 60 GIG HDD. Some where smaller so if you want to use this 80 GIG HDD in this computer you’ll need a PCI to IDE Card and run the bigger drive off that.
  
  Any of these cards should work though depending on the M’Board Maker you may not get the best performance possible from the new HDD though it will be no slower than your current 8 GIG Drives.
  
  Col
- July 26, 2007 at 9:53 pm #2608203
  
  upgrade the BIOS indeed
  
  by bostech · about 17 years, 8 months ago
  
  In reply to New Hard Disk for Pentium II PC
  
  Upgrading the BIOS is often worth a shot. I am late to the party on this one, oh well.
  
  This recently worked on an IBM 300PL PII 350MHz 512MB with XP Pro SP2. The old BIOS was from ’98, while the latest was ’01. I swapped the old Maxtor 10GB 5400RPM for a Seagate 100GB 7200RPM. There were some hiccups with the jumpers and video driver, then all was good.
  
  A PII machine still flying in 2007, what a thrill.
- January 27, 2008 at 6:25 am #2640305
  
  bios options
  
  by somebozo · about 17 years, 2 months ago
  
  In reply to New Hard Disk for Pentium II PC
  
  go into BIOS under IDE options and change it from Enhanced to Compatible. This will somewhat degrade ur hard disk performance however you 80GB will be detected and available at full capacity. The Bios may still read it as 14GB or 20GB however that can be safely ignored.
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