Is there a hard drive missing in this PC?

[LeadFarmer]

Can someone please confirm if theres a second hard drive in my sons PC?

I bought him a gaing PC last year which we specced ourselves, to include a 500gb SSD and a 2TB Baraccuda HD.

He's only just got around to trying to store stuff on the 2TB drive, but it doesn't appear on the PC menu. I'm hoping it's inside the PC but just not connected. If it's there, where do we connect it?

Heres a photo of his screen, showing just one local hard drive..






And photos of inside his PC....

[mikef]

I’m not seeing an HDD cage, let alone a HDD. That’s probably good for airflow. I hope he’s doing regular external or cloud backups

[CorradoTDI]

Doesn't look like it...

Also can't see any bay for it but obviously there is room to mount something

[Civilian47]

Looks like there may be a drive beneath the SSD drive in the second to last picture.

Edited by Civilian47 on Sunday 28th June 16:19

[TiringHippo]

The second to last picture shows what looks like a hard drive caddy, and can just about make out two SATA ports with cables. Assume 1 is for the SSD, and the 2nd is either the 2TB or front panel connector (e-SATA)?

If you click start and type 'computer management' and open the App it will open a window, on the left hand side there will be a item called 'Storage' with 'Disk Management' if you click on 'Disk Management' it will list all the drives the PC can 'see' and indicate if the storage volumes are active.

[nickd01]

If there's one there, it may just not be formatted. Go to Computer Management -> Disk Management and see if it shows up there.

[mikef]

Given the sticker that says 80gold I’m thinking that’s just the PSU there. Very neat build, fwiw

[Condi]

Are they not drive bays behind the PSU?

In reality, its going to be hard for anyone to diagnose over the internet, whereas in person it would be a 2 second job to see if one is there, and if so maybe the wire fell off in transit or something? Take it to a shop and it'll save you hours of poking around.

[gmasterfunk]

I can see the burst patriot ssd and what looks like a hdd beneath. You can make outt the shiny pressed metal.

So yes it's "missing" on the os but advice above should help so long as it's connected

[LunarOne]

There's definitely a Hard disk (HDD) as well as an SSD installed. I can't tell whether it's connected up, but it very likely is. You'll be able to check that if you go into the BIOS, but first of all I'd do what TiringHippo says.

[LeadFarmer]

Thanks, I've just looked in Computer Management and it doesn't seem to be seeing another HD. I'm wondering of a cable isn't connected? If so, is this something I can do myself? I have zero knowledge of computer builds.

Edited by LeadFarmer on Monday 29th June 12:27

[untakenname]

Looks like there's two SATA cables plugged into the MOBO at the bottom right corner, boot into the BIOS and see what drives are showing there.

[LunarOne]

Yes, even if the drive is plugged in, make sure it has a power connector going into it as well, otherwise the computer won't see it. Also in the BIOS there might be a setting to disable the drive so that Windows will never see it. Go through all the storage options labelled Storage or RAID. It's possible that your motherboard has an onboard RAID controller which the drive is connected to, but the RAID controller is disabled. Or possibly it's enabled meaning you might need a special RAID driver to be installed before the disk will show up. Or that you need to configure a RAID logical volume before anything will show up. With only one drive (excluding the SSD) RAID is not going to do you any good so best to try to disable it. Doing that should allow the port to be used as a normal SATA connection meaning the drive will then appear in Disk Management with no extra drivers required. You'll likely still need to create a simple volume in Windows before it will appear in My Computer as a drive letter.

If in doubt, let's see photos of what you see in the BIOS screens.

[Drive Blind]

take the cover off the other side of the chassis and verify the hdd has both cables plugged in

There should be a larger power cable and a smaller data cable

like this

[ZesPak]

Drive Blind said:

take the cover off the other side of the chassis and verify the hdd has both cables plugged in

There should be a larger power cable and a smaller data cable

like this

Just for full disclosure, the "wide" one on that picture is one that goes to the power supply (aka PSU). If you find an extra one that fits, can't go wrong.
The small one (data) connects to your motherboard (MB).
It seems like there's two connected on the MB already, one might be a DVD drive? If you don't have a dvd drive, it will probably go to the HDD (green square):

The red one are two unused ones

There's a "hook" in both the power and data cable, look at the connector and just plug them in.

In theory should be very straightforward, but you might not have the Data cable (called "SATA" cable). Any self-respecting nerd should have a small box of those, see if you can have one for a fiver.

[LeadFarmer]

I’ve never entered bios settings before. If I’ve navigated correctly so far, which option do I take here? I expected to see an option for ‘UEFI Firmware Settings’

[Foliage]

Take the other side panel off and check its plugged in... Looks to me like the hard drive enclosure is accessed from the 'wrong' side. Keeps it looking neat mind.

[LeadFarmer]

Foliage said:

Take the other side panel off .

Mmmm, no obvious way of doing that from what I can see

[Foliage]

LeadFarmer said:

Foliage said:

Take the other side panel off .

Mmmm, no obvious way of doing that from what I can see

Usually a couple of screws on the back panel and then just slides off

[mmm-five]

LeadFarmer said:

I’ve never entered bios settings before. If I’ve navigated correctly so far, which option do I take here? I expected to see an option for ‘UEFI Firmware Settings’

That's Windows diagnostic screen.

You usually need to press F2/F10 (or whatever the mobo manufactuer uses) at start-up to go into the PC's BIOS settings.