The first time I tried to initialize a SAS drive on Z800 failed

[CallofTheWild]

The SAS drive fit perfectly into the drive bay(1) and I moved the Bay 1 cable to the SAS to the SAS(0) controler plug. Bay(0) is still a SATA drive. I also connected all the remaining unused cables(2,3) to the SAS controler plugs as per the HP Service Doc.

The SAS Bios recognizes SAS drive but it can not be initialized. I tried a different SAS drive and had the same problem. I moved the dive to Bay(2) and changed the Bay(2) plug to SAS(0) controler plug thinking a blind connector might be faulty on Bay(1) but the drive still can't be initialized. I just purchased these used SAS drives on ebay and the seller said they worked, so it might be the Z800. Neither Windows 7 or my recovery disk partition manger can initialize it. I get a I/O error from both programs. I've never used the board SAS controller before. How do I know if it is working properly? Can't find any settings in Bios for SAS drives but during the boot, it shows SAS bios initializing. I'm not using Raid but could that be affecting the second HDD somehow?

[DGroves · Accepted solution]

workstation related questions should be posted in the workstation forum

https://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Business-PCs-Workstations-and-Point-of-Sale-Systems/bd-p/Business-PC-W...

also describing how you are trying to initilise the drive and the drive model number will give you the best chance of receiving usefull replies