Gateway Tower ESX500S HDD issue:

R

rgcary

New Member
My father--in-law has a Gateway ESX500s running Windows XP, SP3. I don't have the full model # with me, but that should not really matter at this point. I've installed an extra IDE drive (500GB) in his PC and used the cable select option for the pin setting (this is the slave drive). Windows will recognize it in the bios, but as soon as you turn off the computer it says you don't have a bootable device in the PC and will not boot to Windows. So I select F1 get into the bois and it see's both HDD's and I have to reset the bios to defaults, save it, boot the computer and it see's both HDD's again in Windows. It seems to only happen when the PC is TURNED OFF for any amount of time, not when rebooting? It really has me confused! The CMOS battery was already replaced.

Finding any info on this PC is difficult. I would try to flash the bios, but I've not found the correct one yet!

Any ideas on why this is happening?:confused:
 
It defiently sounds like the battery is dead or possibly the socket for it is broken. Another thing to check is the clear cmos jumper but that should show up with other symptoms.
 
thank you

Cromewell said:
It defiently sounds like the battery is dead or possibly the socket for it is broken. Another thing to check is the clear cmos jumper but that should show up with other symptoms.
Click to expand...

He bought the new CMOS battery so that's why I was confused to see it still happening. Like I said it's only when you shut it off. Restart does not cause this problem. I feel bad because it's not supposed to be like this. Installing another internal HDD is rather simple and it shoud not be like this... The gateway site does not appear to have an updated bios for his system 500s. Ugh.
 
Make sure that the original drive is jumpered for cable select as well. If one is jumpered master and the one you put in is labeled cable select then most likely that is your problem.
 
Jumpers...

Cromewell said:
It defiently sounds like the battery is dead or possibly the socket for it is broken. Another thing to check is the clear cmos jumper but that should show up with other symptoms.
Click to expand...

johnb35 said:
Make sure that the original drive is jumpered for cable select as well. If one is jumpered master and the one you put in is labeled cable select then most likely that is your problem.
Click to expand...

I will look at that again, but I think it's set on cable select and there is one IDE cable to the system board with 2 HDD connections on the cable. The jumper is on the first pin closest to the HDD power. W/out having the HDD in front of me I'm not sure if that's cable select. Do you know?:confused:
 
Without knowing the brand and model number of the hard drive, we can't be sure what setting its at.
 
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