Harddrive not connected to anything??

[JeffK91]

So yeah, I am having a boat load of problems with my PC since I put in my 2nd graphics card for SLI (see my thread in hardware problems). Anyways, so I get a "Disk boot failure, enter system disk and press enter". I can't open either of my cd drives for some reason. So anyways this may sound like a real dumb question but when I was building my PC, I was just about done but needed help with the wiring of where the plugs from the power supply go so I sent it into a PC shop and they did it for me. For 10 months I never opened my PC but it ran fine. Now when I open it up, I notice NOTHING is connected to the harddrive. Absolutely nothing. And after looking at a bunch of pictures of what a normal PC looks like, there is always this long black film roll type connector connected to the HDD. The one that looks similar to the 40 pin connector you connect to your cd drives.

Is this normal at all? Could this be the problem why I am getting the system boot error? I could've accidently knocked down the plug when I was trying to attach my PCI-E 6 pin connector to my video card but I looked EVERYWHERE and canno seem to find a plug that'll fit for the HDD.

I was up all last night trying to figure out why my computer is having these problems but to little avail. Also, for some reason my power button only works SOMETIMES. Then I'd have to turn it on manually via the mobo and even when it's on after a few minutes, the lights on the front of the tower that tell you it is on go off but the PC is still running.

Please help!! I'm afraid if I can' fix it myself, I'll have to send it into a PC shop hoping I won't get the old "run around" treatment.

edit: Also the connector that goes into both my cd drives are connected to the primary IDE drive and there is nothing on the secondary IDE drive.

 

[kmote]

hang on, your computer was working when there was nothing plugged into the back of the boot drive?
if you have an ATA HDD then there should be a 40 pin ATA connector exactly like the one that goes into the optical drive

 

[M733mhz]

If you have a Sata drive, I bet you knocked it out when you weren't paying attention and that's why you're getting the error.

 

[kmote]

yeah, i find that SATA cables (particularly data) come out far too easily
also the small width of the cable and plug might be the reason why he cannot find it??
idk but the fact remains that if there is nothing plugged in the back of the HDD it cannot possibly work (obvious really). however if there is nothing connected to the back then it is possible that the people at the computer shop turned the HDD around to improve the wiring and it is now at the front

 

[j12]

the cd/dvd roms should be in the secondary ide channel and your hdd's should be hooked up to the primary channel.