MPC 4000 inconsistently reads hard drive at boot up

I purchased a used blue MPC 4000 a few months back, and noticed that it inconsistently recognizes the internal hard drive at boot up. I typically need to turn the machine on/off around 3 times until if finally recognizes the internal hard drive. The MPC will never find the hard drive after boot up, its either all or nothing from the start. The CD drive is the same, either recognized with the hard drive or nothing. Is this a common problem? Sign that my hard drive is going bad?

open it up and disconnect and reconnect every cable that you can see. might as well do ram too, it wont hurt it.

if that doesnt help, replace hdd with: viewtopic.php?f=2&t=171621