i have a Zima Blade running Zima OS, works fine until i connect two hard drives to the Zima Blade, is there something in the BIOS that i need to set fix ??
the HD did work fine when i tried them out when i got the blade.
i reset the BIOS to factory setting but still dose not see the HD
Here’s the core issue and what normally causes the ZimaBlade to stop seeing drives after they previously worked.
ZimaBlade’s SATA controller is extremely sensitive to power and cabling. When two drives suddenly disappear, it’s almost always one of these:
Insufficient power from the Molex/SATA splitter
The ZimaBlade’s onboard power header cannot reliably feed two 3.5" HDDs. If the splitter is weak or the drives spin up at the same time, the board will brown-out the SATA controller and the BIOS will simply not enumerate the drives.
The Molex-to-SATA adapter is wired incorrectly
This is common. Some cheap adapters don’t pass 12V properly. A single HDD might still work, but dual drives fail immediately.
The drives are connected to the wrong ports
Both SATA ports on the Blade must be connected directly from the onboard headers. If one cable is loose, the BIOS will ignore both.
USB power interference
If you have any high-draw USB devices plugged in, it can pull power away from the drives at boot.
What you should check
Power the drives from a separate, known-good power supply
This is the most important test. Use an external SATA power brick or a proper powered dock.
If both drives immediately appear in BIOS and ZimaOS, the issue is confirmed: insufficient/unstable power.
Swap the SATA data cables
A single bad cable can prevent enumeration of both ports.
Check BIOS > Advanced > Storage
No special settings needed on ZimaBlade. SATA mode must be AHCI (default). Resetting BIOS to factory is fine.
Disconnect everything except the two drives
No USB storage, no additional devices. Boot the board clean and see if detection returns.
Why this happens
ZimaBlade’s onboard power header was designed for SSDs or a single HDD. When you attach two mechanical drives (or even one mechanical + one SSD), the inrush current during spin-up can exceed what the Blade’s regulator can supply. The board doesn’t crash, instead, the SATA controller fails to initialize, so BIOS reports “no drives.”
This is why they worked the first time but not now: the power margin is right on the edge.
Nothing in BIOS needs changing.
This is a power delivery issue, not a configuration issue.
If you power the drives from a separate supply and they appear immediately, you’ve found the root cause.