I've just bought a Samsung SpinPoint T166 400GB SATA2 16 HDD.

After I connected it up and booted up, I get the following lines:

Scan Devices, Please wait...
Press <Tab> Key into User Manual
Hardware Initiate failed, Please Check Device!!!
The Bios does not be installed. Press <g> to continue!

The M/B is a 2 year old ASUS A8V which uses a 150 MB/s data transfer
rate. After I got the above message, I installed the jumper to force
it to negotiate for 150 MB/s speed with no effect.

OS is Windows XP SP2 with automatic updates up and running.

I've tried:
swapping power leads with working SATA drive (a pair of Maxtor 200GB
drives configured as RAID0).
swapping SATA cables
hooking up to both of the free SATA sockets on my M/B. (I can't do a
swap with the existing HDDs because of the RAID setup)

The question - does the error message indicate a fault with the drive
or my computer?

Regards,
vj

"Vittorio Janus" <vittorio.janus (AT) ntlworld (DOT) com> wrote

have you installed the SATA driver...................

"Fergus" <999 (AT) 118btinternet (DOT) com> wrote

That advice is useless as the OP has not even gotten to that point yet.




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On Tue, 24 Apr 2007 20:32:27 +0100, Vittorio Janus
<vittorio.janus (AT) ntlworld (DOT) com> wrote:

Do you have the BIOS set correctly?

OnBoard Promise Controller [Enabled]
Allows you to enable or disable the onboard Promise® RAID controller.
Configuration options: [Disabled] [Enabled]
Operating Mode [RAID Mode]
This item sets the onboard Promise controller operating mode. This
item appears only when the Onboard Promise Controller item is set to
Enabled. Configuration options: [RAID Mode] [IDE Mode] <-- set to IDE
Mode

On Wed, 25 Apr 2007 04:01:21 GMT, Andy <1@2.3> wrote:

Maxtor HDDs as a RAID 0 pair with no problems. These are connected to
a pair of SATA connections labelled "SATA RAID 1" & "SATA RAID 2"

The M/B has a 2nd pair has a 2nd pair of SATA connections labelled
"SATA 1" & "SATA 2", both of which I've tried. I can't try plugging
the existing SATA HDs into these connections because they are
stripped, not mirrored.

The "Hardware Initiate failed, Please Check Device!!!" error message
comes up before I enter the BIOS setup program - e.g. I press Delete
on start up to enter Setup. After checking USB and something that
disappears too quickly for me to pick up, it starts a new screen with
the top line "VIA Technology SATA RAID BIOS Setting Utility v2.0.1"
followed by the Scan devices etc. error message. I press <g> and it
then goes into the Promise Controller page, scans for IDE devices,
then sets up the SATA RAID and only then goes into the BIOS setup
screen.

The only mention of SATA that I can see is that the OnChip SATA Boot
Rom is enabled.



Regards,
vj

"Vittorio Janus" <vittorio.janus (AT) ntlworld (DOT) com> wrote

you see those "too quick to read" things.

"Forrest" <REMOVETHISrunforrest1 (AT) hotmail (DOT) com> wrote


Mike.

On Tue, 24 Apr 2007 20:32:27 +0100, Vittorio Janus
<vittorio.janus (AT) ntlworld (DOT) com> wrote:

Update:
Komplett said that the HD was faulty and replaced it. Replacement was
received 11th May and gave the identical fault message

Samsung also said the HD was faulty and gave me the telephone number
of their warranty agent. This was after 5pm on Friday and they were
shut until this morning.

Since I found it difficult to believe that 2 HDs would have the same
problem I searched on the ASUS web-site. A suggestion on that site in
relation to a problem was to press the re-set button in the search
period before the error message came up. And it worked!


Regards,
vj