Hard drive not recognized during Windows installation

I recently ran into a problem with my main system hard drive...I ran out of space. So, I scrapped it and bought a Samsung SpinPoint T 500 GB SATA drive on which I want to install the Windows partition and use as the system drive. After I installed the hardware, I put in my XP disk and booted it up. During BIOS bootup I saw that the drive was recognized, as well as my other internal drive ( Western Digital ATA using the Slave part of the ATA ribbon) and my Seagate external. However, when I got to the Windows installation setup, the Samsung drive was not recognized as a possible installation destination. I ordered this drive from NewEgg, and it did not come with any software. Is my problem that I need to install a driver for the HDD?

The drive needs to be partitioned and have the correct file system put on it first. Currently it will be in just a raw data form so it needs to be partitioned and formatted to NTFS.

I forget if Fdisk still works through XP setups to be honest as that is what I would have previously used.

If you have another system working it might be worth just popping it in there and getting it formatted to NTFS first, you can then swap it over to your other system and you should be set.

Coincidence this really as im currently just setting up a 500GB Samsung Spinpoint T in my system too, takes an absolute age to format it!

Thanks mac...I will try that

Make sure you install the sata drivers..

is that for the first time I use sata on my mobo, or for the specific drive?...also how large would you recommend I make my xp partition on a 500 GB drive?

If SATA drives don't have drivers, they default as slave to any IDE drives sometimes. If you haven't before, you might as well.

How ever large you want it! You'll want it at least 100GB.

As Trizoy said for some motherboards you need to get the SATA drivers for SATA drives to be visable to the windows XP installer. Look for the driver set that is for the F6 method.



It's not defaulting to slave or anything like that, the installer just doesn't know how to use the SATA controller without the drivers for certain chipsets.