Laptop originally had VISTA, but I don't have disks so I have XP install disk only

1. Vista HP Pavillion laptop crashed
      THEN
2. HP recovery utility failed
     SO
3. Partition Magic used to create a single NTFS primary partition that was set to "ACTIVE"
    THEN
4. BIOS Quick, comprehensive, and SMART drive tests all WITHOUT ERRORS
   THEN
5. Windows XP install fails "Hard drive Not Found"
 THEN
6. MEMORY and HARD DRIVE REMOVED AND RESEATED
 THEN
7. Partition Magic used to create a single DOS32 primary partition that was set to "ACTIVE"
 THEN
8. Windows XP install fails "Hard drive Not Found"
THEN
9. BIOS setup "return to default settings"
THEN
10. #3 thru #7 repeated
STILL

HARD drive found by BIOS and Partition Magic BUT NOTwindows Install
HELP !!!!!!!!
Despite your HDD tests, it's LOOKING more like a HDD FAILURE.  The System crashed, the recovery failed.  Other than that, I have no ideas. Sorrymy laptop refused to accept a XP install, giving me the same error, before I acquired the proper SATA drivers for the laptop.

It's entirely possible that like my laptop, yours doesn't have drivers for XP.  You may need to contact the vendor, what make and model do you have?Needed to set BIOS to non-SATA or install SATA drivers via seperate Cd during windows install.

THANKS EVERYBODY