Hard drive boot issue

[tcman41]

I am trying to fix a friend's computer and problems abound. About 7 weeks ago a friend's computer wouldn't start anymore, i found out the graphics card was dead and replaced it, their machine was also running really slow so i reformatted the hard drive and put on a fresh copy of windows xp, the computer worked perfect.

After they picked the computer up a month later, brought it home and plugged it in, it wouldn't start. I brought it home and found the motherboard was dead, replaced the board, power supply, memory and graphics card and hard drive. Loaded on windows xp, motherboard drivers, updates and some software, computer would boot up fine but only after i would hit the start button about 5 times in a row.

Since the hard drive was still laying outside of the case i secured the hard drive in the case after having to remove and reinsert the memory becuase it was in the way. If i have the 4 wire power cable connected to the hard drive it won't boot at all. If i disconnect the 4 wire power connector from the hard drive the computer will boot but then display a message of "verifying pool data error", "insert system disc", this is the main problem, how to fix?

I have tried everything in the world from unplugging the optical drives, tweaking settings in the bios, changing the jumper settings on the hard drive etc, as long as the 4 wire power connector is connected to the hard drive the computer won't boot. Any suggestions would be welcome.

Computer specs:
ECS NF650iSLIT-A (V1.0) motherboard with nVIDIA® nForce 650i SLI chipset
Intel socket 775 p4 3.0ghz cpu with standard intel heatsink/fan
seagate 80gb ide hard drive set as master on ide channel 0
cd/dvd rom drive set as master on ide channel 1
nvidia 8400 es pci-e graphics card
corsair 2gb ddr2-800 memory (2 1gb sticks running in dual channel mode)
dell 17" lcd monitor
standard keyboard and optical mouse
standard floppy drive
powerup 450watt power supply

Some additional set up questions:

When setting translation mode for my new seagate 80gb ide hard drive should i choose, auto, large, CHS or LBA?

when connecting cables to connectors on motherboard such as reset switch, power switch, hard drive led light etc, does the little arrow on the back of the cable connector always go to pin one position of the respective connector on the motherboard?

My new motherboard is bigger than the footprint in the bottom of my case and thus there are no standoffs in the bottom of the case to screw the 3 most right screws in the motherboard to, does this matter?

Terry

[mechbas]

"If i have the 4 wire power cable connected to the hard drive it won't boot at all. If i disconnect the 4 wire power connector from the hard drive the computer will boot but then display a message of "verifying pool data error", "insert system disc", this is the main problem, how to fix?"
Try putting another power cable from the PSU to the HD and try. If this fails then you have dead drive.
As for the above paste, the ribbon cable is for DATA only, with your power cable disconnected you have no power to spin the drive's platter nor move the read/write head(s).

[cguan_77]

the red wire on your data cable should be in parallel with the red wire also on your power connector, if all the settings are correct then measure the output of your power connector it should be +5 and +12 but not sure which color got this reading, if all are okay then your HDD is causing the trouble