This is what appears during the boot sequence if its any help.
VP_IDE: IDE controller at PCI slot 00:11.1
VP_IDE: chipset revision 6
VP_IDE: not 100% native mode: will probe irqs later
VP_IDE: VIA vt8235 (rev 00) IDE UDMA133 controller on pci00:11.1
ide0: BM-DMA at 0xb400-0xb407, BIOS settings: hda
MA, hdb
MA
ide1: BM-DMA at 0xb408-0xb40f, BIOS settings: hdc
MA, hdd
io
hda: WDC WD1800JB-00DUA0, ATA DISK drive
hdb: Maxtor 6Y160P0, ATA DISK drive
blk: queue c03be900, I/O limit 4095Mb (mask 0xffffffff)
blk: queue c03bea44, I/O limit 4095Mb (mask 0xffffffff)
hdc: CREATIVE CD5233E-CF, ATAPI CD/DVD-ROM drive
ide0 at 0x1f0-0x1f7,0x3f6 on irq 14
ide1 at 0x170-0x177,0x376 on irq 15
hda: host protected area => 1
hda: 351651888 sectors (180046 MB) w/8192KiB Cache, CHS=21889/255/63, UDMA(100)
ide-floppy driver 0.99.newide
Partition check:
hda: hda1 hda2 hda3
ide-floppy driver 0.99.newide
md: md driver 0.90.0 MAX_MD_DEVS=256, MD_SB_DISKS=27
md: Autodetecting RAID arrays.
md: autorun ...
Still searching for a clue!!