Amiga 600 that wont recognise hard disk! AAAAARRRRGGGHHH!!

[zx6r6]

Right, thats it, I give up!! I've installed a 250 meg 2.5" hard disk in my newly aquired 600 and partitioned it etc with hard disk tools. The problem is that the system point blank refuses to aknowledge its there even after rebooting. It doesn't show anything in the early startup either. I'm running workbench 3.1, kickstart 2 v37.300. Is this a ROM issue?

[zx6r6]

Oh bugger! Looks like I need newer roms.

Thanks for your help.

[zx6r6]

Hmmmmm, from what I've read your drive shouldn't work! in view of the fact that yours does maybe there's a problem with my 600 or the hard disk. Is it possible that my hard drive is taking too long to spin up to be recognised by the os? It doesn't list it in the early startup menu. I've tried warm rebooting but doing this restarts the hard disk aswell and again it isnt shown in early startup.

[zx6r6]

Still no good! Listening hard I think the floppy drive clicks just before the hard disk has finished its startup/reset procedure. Just ordered a cheap (£10) set of 3.1 roms on ebay, lets hope this cures it!

Thanks all!

[zx6r6]

At last! 3.1 Rom turned up today and now the 600 hard drive works like a charm. Prior to rom fitting, after I cut pin 1 it worked after a reset so I it was a spin-up problem.

After having my first 'real' go on the 600 today I'm suprised at just how damn slow it is. Funny how my impression of speed has changed so much in the last 10+ years, I always remembered them (well, my 500) being reasonably zippy!
Wonder what a zx81 'feels' like now? gonna dig it out the loft tomorrow and give it a go!

cheers for suggestions all