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Author Topic: "no Disk Drive Found On /dev/hda"  (Read 114 times)

TheWeirdGuy

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"no Disk Drive Found On /dev/hda"
« on: April 19, 2009, 02:16:00 PM »
Hi everyone.  I've been following some guides, one of which is on this site, to properly perform a hotswap and softmod my Xbox through xboxhdm.

Anyway, I took care of all of the on-computer and in-BIOS preparations (made, then burned disc with NDURE 3.0 and set BIOS to boot from CD first).

The first hitch I ran into came after I hotswapped the IDE cable and initiated the process on the CD.  I made it through the first screen, but then when the second came up and I entered "xbrowser" a few lines scrolled then said, "No disk drive found on /dev/hda".  A few more lines scrolled and said "No xbox-partition table found on /dev/hda".

I deduce that this has something to do with the xbox HDD being improperly unlocked.  I've tried multiple methods.  First, I copied a song to the HDD, took the CD out, played it from the HDD for about 10 seconds, paused it, and then performed the swap.  Since that didn't work, I gave myself an error 12 (unplugging IDE to CD/DVD in Xbox).  That still didn't work.  After that, I put in a game, started playing for a minute or so, then in the middle of gameplay performed the hotswap.  Again, it didn't work.

Maybe the issue is with my timing.  I'll give you an example.  If I'm trying the error 12 way, I start up the Xbox and the PC at the same time.  Then, the error 12 comes up.  10 or so seconds later, I'd say, the disc loads up on the PC.  Right then, I quickly but carefully yank out the IDE cable from the Xbox HDD and insert the primary master cable from the PC, that done in the course of maybe 15-20 seconds.  Then, I hit 1 on the PC keyboard, press enter and go on with the process.  (One time I waited 30 seconds after performing the swap to hit 1 or 2, but that didn't help.)

Lastly, the problem could be with my computer, I suppose.  Because my most recent build used a motherboard with only one IDE port (connected to DVD+/-R and the HDD is SATA), I used my old, old computer circa 2000.  It's a Pentium III 866 Mhz.  Would its age have any bearing on this?  I suppose I could use my P4, if necessary, but I shied away from that since it's MicroATX with a small case and thus a rainforest of long, winding IDE cables in there.

Anyway, sorry if I wrote too much, but could any of you more experienced in the ways of softmodding give me tips?
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Heimdall

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"no Disk Drive Found On /dev/hda"
« Reply #1 on: April 19, 2009, 02:44:00 PM »
You're hotswapping at the wrong time. Once the error 12 comes up it's too late - the disk has relocked. You have to swap when the white Microsoft logo appears under the large X. The sequence is set up the PC, power on the Xbox, unplug the Xbox IDE cable at the Microsoft logo, plug the PC IDE into the Xbox disk, boot the PC.

.....and use NDURE 3.1. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)
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TheWeirdGuy

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"no Disk Drive Found On /dev/hda"
« Reply #2 on: April 19, 2009, 03:00:00 PM »
Alright, thanks.  One thing, though, I just tried to get it to go to error 12 again, but now whenever I do that (unplug IDE on CD/DVD), it gives me an error 7 instead.  Which is strange since my HDD works fine with the CD/DVD IDE plugged in.  So I did the swap (starting with everything in the Xbox plugged in as normal) right after the white Microsoft logo appeared.  I had the same issue...

A couple more things...  My dashboard version is 5960 and my kernel is 5101.

I burned the CD-R with NDURE on it in a different PC than the one I'm using for the swap.  I really can't see any way that would have to do anything with my troubles, but I thought I'd mention it because, hey, you never know.
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Mr. Og

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"no Disk Drive Found On /dev/hda"
« Reply #3 on: April 20, 2009, 12:04:00 AM »
WeirdGuy, I'm a much bigger n00b than you, but I just wanted to say that I used the exact same processor as you to do my softmod, so the speed is probably not the issue.
Although, I'd guess that the mobo/chipset is far more meaningful than the processor regarding the HDD...
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TheWeirdGuy

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"no Disk Drive Found On /dev/hda"
« Reply #4 on: April 20, 2009, 02:41:00 PM »
Hmm...  Well, thanks for the tip.  The PIII computer has some sort of stock Dell motherboard in there.  However, I did try it on the P4 that I spoke of earlier, still no luck.  All that's left is my more recent AMD build, but I guess I'll have put the DVD+/-R on the Primary slave, even though it's not recommended.

Still, with it not working on two computers already, it seems like it's not compatibility that's the issue.  I must be doing something wrong.  I'll fiddle around with it a little more later today.
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