[Filmo]

I've got a wierd problem. Just bought a 'stock' Sawtooth used. Stock drive, AGP graphics card, DVD Drive, Zip Drive and memory (256 mb)

I was able to install 9.2.2 without any problems.

However, when I put the 10.3 install disk in the CD/DVD drive and begin the process, then it gets interesting. When it comes time to 'select a destination' it's not seeing any hard drive attached to the internal ATA bus. Even 'Disk Utility' (from the install disc) doesn't see the drive(s).

In 9.2.2 I reformated the drive, no luck. Changed it from Master to Slave, no luck.

Finally I took the drive out, installed it in a different machine, and successfully installed 10.3 on the drive. Removed it from the other machine and put it into the Sawtooh machine in question. Boots fine and was able to upgrade it to 10.3.4 without any problems. Seems to work fine.

Question: Why wasn't I able to install 10.3 directly on to the machine? (i.e. why didn't the installer 'see' the hard drive?)

[Detrius]

That is odd. Is there a firmware update that hasn't been installed? Run Software Update while booted into OS 9.

[Filmo]

It seem like OS 10.3.x is more sensitive about ATA drives being correctly configured.

The drive on the machine was set to 'SLAVE' instead of 'MASTER' and it was the only drive on the chain. In the past, it seems like OS X looked past that mis-configuration, and thus allowed installs on to an ATA chain if there was a 'SLAVE' drive but not a MASTER. This no longer seems to be the case. The first drive on the chain must be MASTER.

Noticed the same problem with a OS X 10.3 machine with a Sonnet ATA card in it. On one of the chains, we had a drive by itself set to SLAVE. It wasn't showing up when booted into 10.3.x After changing the drive to MASTER, the drive now appears. When the machine was running as OS 10.2.x the drive used to appear even though it was set as SLAVE and the only drive on the chain...