Thanx Nick - don't have any hair left - eyebrows are next.
chkdsk didn't seem to work on the sata drive - chugged for a ong time then some error re unsupported system.
I'll watch the football game and stay calm.

there is something very wrong.. CHKDSK C: /r should have run if the storage system is being recognized by the BIOS
If all else fails above.. clear the CMOS on the system with it unplugged, enter the BIOS, exit menu.. LOAD SETUP DEFAULTS F-10 save and exit return to the BIOS and reset it back up (no clocking) ... locate the drives and verify they are set correctly
Note.. I forgot to tell you that moving the drive to another SATA port may clear the 7B error but Windows may, or may not boot. The idea is to get this 7B error clear and figure out if this is a bad cable, port, BIOS, or what