I am currently running this PC on an 80GB SATA drive. I bought a 160GB SATA drive to help with storage and the like. However, no matter what I do, my system will not accept it.

When I ran the install CD and connected the drive as instructed..I went to boot up and I get to the Windows screen where it hangs up and then gives me a blue screen of death error message. STOP: 0x0000007B. So I check all the connections and try again. Same deal.

I then disconnected my old drive and plugged the SATA cable and power supply directly into the drive thinking I could attempt to install the drive as if it would be my primary drive. No dice. It would not even detect the drive. I even booted from the Seagate disc that came with it. Couldn't run diagnostics or anything because still, it would not read the drive. Tried to boot from my xp CD and use the F6 to install SATA/RAID drive...but still it would not detect the drive.

I spent several hours googling shit and talking to people on IRC...time and time again, it came back to my bios not being configured right. So, I downloaded my mobo's utility for bios update. I updated just fine but couldn't find any options in my bios to alter SATA settings, which I thought was retarded. I kept fooling around, but never found them. I found some step by step guides that even had fucking pictures of the bios screen for each step. I was further baffled when I watched people access menus that I could not. I then downloaded the manual for my mobo and went through the SATA options/guide there. Again, there are pictures of sub-menus in the bios that I myself cannot reach.

Where I am supposed to go - Advanced Bios options -> Integrated Peripherals -> On-Chip SATA-IDE Controller -> SATA settings...but i get stuck at On-Chip SATA-IDE Controller. On my screen, I can only set it to disabled or enabled, but in the manual they pull up another fucking mini window/menu that can be set it to enabled, disabled, and some other stuff.

( I know they currently have the PCI little menu up, but when I open the PCI menu, I see completely different shit. :( I don't want to make a RAID array, but I should be able to at least change my SATA settings, which I cannot do.)

That is what the shit looks like...but I can't get the little menu to come up. I think this is the core of my problem, but I have no idea how to get it to work.

Help would be appreciated.

Note: My mobo is a MSI K8T Neo 2 Series MS 6702E Version 1. All the specs and stuff can be found here. http://www.msi.com.tw/program/products/mainboard/mbd/pro_mbd_detail.php?UID=608

Both of my drives are Seagate drives. The first is an 80GB drive and the new one is a 160GB drive. The info for the drive can be found here.

http://www.seagate.com/support/disc/specs/sata/st3160812as.html

I was just at the Seagate website browsing some more and found a page that said my mobo might not support the transfer rate that the HD is capable of. It says that if this is the case, I'd have to use a jumper cable to limit the rate to 1.5 Gbits per second. I will not do this tonight, because I have to get up for work in a few hours. If this is the solution, I may have to hurt someone or something that I see on the street tomorrow night.

BAKA

TAKEN STRAIGHT FROM YOUR MOTHERBOARD'S MANUAL:

Serial ATA/Serial ATA RAID Connectors controlled by VT8237: SATA1/SATA2 The Southbridge of this mainboard is VT8237 which supports two serial connectors SATA1 and SATA2. SATA1 & SATA2 are dual high-speed Serial ATA interface ports. Each supports 1st generation serial ATA data rates of 150 MB/s.

JUMPER THAT GUY TO 150MB/S. DONT GIVE INTO FISH'S BRAGGING ABOUT HIS SUPER MOTHERBOARD THAT SUPPORTS BOTH TECHNOLOGIES. MAKE SURE YOUR HARDWARE IS COMPATABLE BEFORE PLAYING WITH IT. I HOPE THIS WORKS FOR YOU. STAY OUT OF THE WATER WHEN THERE ARE JELLYFISH.

MIND THE CAPS?

I didnt tell him to go and buy a 300/mbps HD, I just said they do exist/are compatable with My mobo. and to bring up another point, according to seagate the transfer rate is up to 300/mbps. With most kit this means that if the mobo only supports 150, it'll only read at 150 max even if it's a 300. A jumper setting change sounds about right. I was referring to size anyway when I was recommending Harddrives, i.e. 160gig not transfer rate.

Conan did you buy it from a shop you can return it to? they should abide by returns policy and swap something that doesn't work, that or a jumper setting to make it compat.

I didnt tell him to go and buy a 300/mbps HD

As far as I noticed (although it was a quick look) your mobo won't support this hd. You need a mobo that supports SATA2 hds. You might find pci card with that utility though. I suggest trading for a SATA1 hd or buy this pci card. But some SATA2 hds can be turned into SATA1, but you need to check in the manual.