2nd hard drive shows in BIOS but not Disk Management

IllNate

New Member
Messages
4
Hello Everyone,

Over the last couple days, I built a new PC and installed windows 8.1. Initially I had some issues installing windows, so I unplugged all my drives except the SSD and DVD. I installed windows to my SSD.

Everything works great!

Now I started adding my drives back in 1 at a time. When I plugged my 2nd SSD in, it showed up in BIOS, but not in Disk Management or Device Manager. So I booted back into the install CD, it showed up in the disk manager there. Since this was also a blank SSD, I partitioned and formated the drive from the install CD, then exited the installer and booted back to my windows drive.

I have 2 SSD drives working great!

Now to add my 2TB HDD... Same issue, it shows up in BIOS and the install disc, but not in Disk Management or Device Manager. This drive does not have a boot partition on it, however, it does have two existing data partitions. They were made from my previous windows 7 system and the option to delete these partitions is grayed out in the install disc menu. I also have some data that I would like to keep on it. I have a USB dock that I can use to read the contents of the disk just fine. Everything is there and in working order.

Can anyone help me out here? What is different about Windows 8.1 that is preventing my hard drives from showing up in windows proper? I am reading things about UEFI online, but nothing seems to fit my exact scenario. I will try and post some screen shots when I get back at it.

System:
Mobo- Asrock Fatal1ty Killer z87
CPU- i3 4330
GPU- Gigabyte 660 OC
SSDs - Kingston V300 120GB
Windows 8.1 64bit

Thanks Everyone!
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8.1
A drive can be partitioned and formatted but if for some reason it doesn't have a drive letter it will not show up in explorer/My PC. It should however show up in Disk management and device manager. I'm not sure what's going on. Booting up from the install DVD loads Windows PE, Preinstallation Environment. It's similar to booting up from a Linux Live CD. It's Windows, its just running from the DVD not the hard drive. What were your issues that necessitated your unplugging drives? Also where did you obtain your install media? Did you do a clean install?
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 10 Education 64 Bit
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Asus
    CPU
    AMD Phenom II X4 980 Black Edition Deneb 3.7GHz
    Motherboard
    ASUS M4N68T-M V2 µATX Motherboard
    Memory
    8GB 4GBx2 Kingston PC10600 DDR3 1333 Memory
    Graphics Card(s)
    NVIDIA Geforce GT640 2 Gig DDR3 PCIe
    Sound Card
    VIA VT1708s High Definition Audio 8-channel Onboard
    Monitor(s) Displays
    22" LG E2242 1080p and 2 19" I-INC AG191D
    Screen Resolution
    1280x1024 - 1920x1080 - 1280x1024
    Hard Drives
    Crucial MX100 256 GB SSD and 500 GB WD Blue SATA
    PSU
    Thermaltake TR 620
    Case
    Power Up Black ATX Mid-Tower Case
    Cooling
    Stock heatsink fan
    Keyboard
    Logitech Wireless K350 Wave
    Mouse
    Logitech M570 Trackball and T650 TouchPad
    Internet Speed
    80 Mbps Down 30 Mbps Up
    Browser
    Internet Explorer 11
    Antivirus
    Windows Defender
    Other Info
    HP DVD1040e Lightscribe - External USB2
- I installed all the drivers first thing and made sure they were the latest off the website, not the CD.
- This was a clean install on an unpartitioned SSD drive.

I unplugged all my drives during install because I have 2 identical SSDs and I wanted to know which one physically contained my OS. I was also having issues with one of my 500GB drives on my old system and didn't want that to complicate anything. But, I haven't even gotten to that drive yet, I'm still trying to get my known good drives up and running in Windows.

Thanks.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8.1
OK, I'm with you now. I still don't know what's wrong but I understand why you unplugged the drives. Best guess is to check your BIOS and look for any RAID functions and turn them off.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 10 Education 64 Bit
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Asus
    CPU
    AMD Phenom II X4 980 Black Edition Deneb 3.7GHz
    Motherboard
    ASUS M4N68T-M V2 µATX Motherboard
    Memory
    8GB 4GBx2 Kingston PC10600 DDR3 1333 Memory
    Graphics Card(s)
    NVIDIA Geforce GT640 2 Gig DDR3 PCIe
    Sound Card
    VIA VT1708s High Definition Audio 8-channel Onboard
    Monitor(s) Displays
    22" LG E2242 1080p and 2 19" I-INC AG191D
    Screen Resolution
    1280x1024 - 1920x1080 - 1280x1024
    Hard Drives
    Crucial MX100 256 GB SSD and 500 GB WD Blue SATA
    PSU
    Thermaltake TR 620
    Case
    Power Up Black ATX Mid-Tower Case
    Cooling
    Stock heatsink fan
    Keyboard
    Logitech Wireless K350 Wave
    Mouse
    Logitech M570 Trackball and T650 TouchPad
    Internet Speed
    80 Mbps Down 30 Mbps Up
    Browser
    Internet Explorer 11
    Antivirus
    Windows Defender
    Other Info
    HP DVD1040e Lightscribe - External USB2
- I installed all the drivers first thing and made sure they were the latest off the website, not the CD.
- This was a clean install on an unpartitioned SSD drive.

I unplugged all my drives during install because I have 2 identical SSDs and I wanted to know which one physically contained my OS. I was also having issues with one of my 500GB drives on my old system and didn't want that to complicate anything. But, I haven't even gotten to that drive yet, I'm still trying to get my known good drives up and running in Windows.

Thanks.

Have you tried Minitool Partition Wizard. You may just need to assign driver letters
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8.1 Pro MC
    Computer type
    Laptop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Asus G75VW / Z97 Pro
    CPU
    Intel Core i7-3610QM / I7-4790K
    Motherboard
    Z97 Pro
    Memory
    16 GB Hyundai HTM315156CFR8C-PB PC3-12800
    Graphics Card(s)
    nVIDIA GeForce GTX 670M (GF114M)
    Sound Card
    VIA 6.0.10.1600
    Screen Resolution
    1080
    Hard Drives
    Samsung 850 Pro 256, Samsung 850 Pro 1TB
    Internet Speed
    30 down 3 up
    Browser
    Explorer 11
    Antivirus
    NIS and Malwarebytes
I could try another tool, but the drive doesn't even show up in the device manager... so I'm not hopeful.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8.1
Well, I took some screenshots with minitool and diskpart with the drive plugged into the usb and then to the motherboard, from within windows and then from the install disk. After I got all my screenshots and booted back to windows the drive appeared.... so the problem is solved, but I don't know how.

My next headache is that I had a mirrored drive set up in my old install. This makes it a "dynamic drive", which isn't readable in windows!!! WTF good is that? And windows can't convert it back to a basic drive without wiping the data? I gotta get/pay for 3rd party tools.

Thanks for the input everyone!
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8.1
Back
Top