Operating system not found - HD not showing in Bios

[Jeffneedshelp]

I removed the HDD and put in another machine. BIOS DID see the hard drive. i took the HDD from the working machine put it in and got the same message, operating system not found.  Checked in bios and still the same.
Primary IDE control: NONE
secondary IDE control: CD-ROM

[Raptor]

Guess the laptop has had it, then.

[Jeffneedshelp]

well it needs to give it back

[Raptor]

I don't think there is much you can do, laptop parts are very hard to replace. But you can try looking for a broken one that has the parts that you need.

[Jeffneedshelp]

there is no way i am giving up that easy. this notebook is not fried.  ;Di when i get it fixed i will send you a picture of me sitting behind it

[Raptor]

Alright, let us know what fixed it.

[patio]

I removed the HDD and put in another machine. BIOS DID see the hard drive. i took the HDD from the working machine put it in and got the same message, operating system not found.  Checked in bios and still the same.
Primary IDE control: NONE
secondary IDE control: CD-ROM

How did Windows report the drive in the other machine ? ?

[Jeffneedshelp]

Hello,
Well after a few nights of staying up till 3am, searching every web forum, troubleshooting, learning how to creat cd rom boot disk, running utilities in dos, resetting cmos...you name it i did it.
Last night at 2:56am, I was just about to give up! I put the hDD back in, this time WITHOUT screws and the cover, pushed the power button...WELCOME TO WINDOWS XP....I felt like i won the lottery. 
Thanks for the help Raptor. She fires right up with no screws holding the drive in. When i removed the HDD (the first time)  it appered to be sitting at a slight angle. Any ideas, I figured the ribbon is not sitting correctly.  Once again thanks. The web site this forum is on, has been alot of help just learning about bios and cmos