HP Z600 - disks inside the internal tray not recognized

[RogerT268]

HI,

    I bought a HP Z600 without disk/OS. But the sales pictures show Windows 10 system configuration, therefore I just trusted the seller without asking the boot demonstration.  It comes with two CD/DVD drives installed. It's dual CPUs with 48GB memory. 

I installed two disks (Segate 500Gb and WD 1TB)  into the internal disk tray.  Make sure they are locked and inserted firmly. One of the disk is Win7 and the other is NFTS data disk from other system.  I boot two different standalone "backup" software from both CD and USB pen drive.  Both backup software boot fine, but both can not recognized disks inside the internal tray, "no disks presented for backup".  If only disks inside tray are available,  the BIOS shows no bootable system disk available. 

From BIOS F9 boot order to choose, it only shows optical drive, USB drive and ethernet controller. Not SATA ? Is it normal? 

Also during BIOS F10 booting process,  I saw  SATA0 and SATA 1 show  DVD/CD 1,  DVD/CD2 and usb pen drive.  SATA2-SATA5 no devices.  How about the internal drive tray? Which SATA port they should allocate? 

BIOS setup:

Storage : 

       Device configuration :   Default values : SATA default. 

        Storage Options 

               SATA emulation :  RAID + AHCI

               SATA port 0 -5   :  GEN2/3.0 Gbps (internal only) 

Security: 

           Device Security :

            all ports :  device available  except  Embedded security device :  device hidden. 

Any suggestions?

Thanks,

Roger

[RogerT268]

 "Boot Order"   only shows    optical drive,  USB drive and  Embedded Ethernet controller. 

Why the the "Hard Drive" is missing?  Where in the BIOS I can make "Hard Drive" appear in the boot order again? 

The disks are in the internal drive tray. 

Thanks,

Roger

[RogerT268]

Here is the BIOS screen shot after F10

[TheOldMan · Accepted solution]

That would seem the hard drives are not connected properly.  First I would connect the hard drive SATA connections to the SATA 00 for the drive that will be the boot drive.  Then install the OS on that drive.  Keeping in mind that there is also a power connection needed.  Move the DVD drive from port 01 to port 03.

The disk that is Win 7, assuming from another system, probably will not work in the machine unless it was also HP Z600.  But you can try it in the port 00 SATA.

Here are all the manuals for that PC

https://support.hp.com/us-en/product/setup-user-guides/hp-z600-workstation/3718663

[RogerT268]

Thanks Sir,  

    I just could not address you as "TheOldMan", which is not polite, IMHO.   You are right on the money.  Last night, during the dream, I remembered my first HP Z600 several years ago when I installed SSD as the third drive, besides the two internal drives. I could not make SSD boot. Therefore I switched the SATA cables between  SATA port 0 (blue mark)  and SSD SATA cable/port.    Then SSD booted  as the Windows 10 system drive. 

    When I waked up after the dream around 5:00am, i checked the HP Z600 maintenance manual, I found out the "HDD Bay 0,1" are the SATA cables  for the internal drives.  And there it is, those two cables are "NOT" connected.  

     After taking the picture of working Windows 10 system configuration from task manager, the seller disconnected "HDD Bay 0,1" cables and inserted two CD/DVD SATA cables to port 0,1. That's extra effort.  I just assumed that  "HDD Bay 0,1" cables should be connected.  case closed. 

Thanks Sir for your prompt response. 

Regards,

Roger

[TheOldMan]

You are welcome.  So glad it worked.