Slave IDE drive causing boot failure

[KristianGregory]

Hi,

I've come across an odd problem with a secondary slave drive (160gb seagate). Currently the drive is not connected and I have a 80gb maxtor drive as master, and a sony dvd-rewriter drive as slave. If I switch the dvd-drive ide cable to be attached to the 160gb seagate slave the computer posts, but then windows does not load. I am not prompted to switch off and connect a master drive. The screen is simply blank and windows (XP SP3) fails to load.

The history is that I have just bought a new PC (specs avail) and carried these drives across from old PC. Previously the drive worked fine, used for data storage only. I would very much like to access this data and copy it across to my 80GB drive (only 1 IDE slot on the mobo so can only connect 2 things at once).

Things I've tried:
Reseting the CMOS
verifying jumper settings (maxtor is master, seagate is slave, no use of cable select)
Verifying power cables are connected properly

Things I will try shortly:
loading the drive via a usb-ide adapter (soon as i get my hands on one)

Now I won't be able to keep the adapter so I'm hoping to resolve this issue by another means. Please let me know if you have any more suggestions.

Thanks and Regards,
Kris

[Agent]

It sounds like it could be trying to boot from the drive.

Install it, go into the BIOS, check the boot order, save and exit

Otherwise you could try it on the other IDE channel if you have one?

[peterb]

I think that rather than faff about - go to the USB adapter solution. Am I right in thinking that the seagate was the boot drive in the other machine?

One thing that might be worth trying is disconnecting the DVD writer - rebooting to check that the drive has been unistalled, then powering down and connecting the secondary drive - and check that it has been recognised in the BIOS.

But for a one off transfer - go the USB route.

[KristianGregory]

Thanks for this,

I've checked the boot order and it is correct. When installing I often made the mistake of having the bios pointing to the wrong device, but I would always get "please reboot and connect device with operating system" or something to that effect when this happened, so shouldn't be getting blank screen for that error. There is only a single IDE channel (when did IDE get so unpopular, I missed that...)

USB does sound promising, IDE is always a bit temperemental when it comes to switching drives. Thanks for your advice, will let you know how it goes.

Kris

edit: No the seagate has always been a slave

[Agent]

What happens if you keep pressing F8 to get into safe mode? Any luck?

Otherwise going with Peter on this one. The USB route will probably save time / hassle if you're looking for a quick solution

[KristianGregory]

quick update on this:

Tried the usb adapter...tried to install it but windows failed, claiming a hardware problem. Tried various other set ups and jumper transfers ect...but no luck, still froze if it was connected on startup and windows couldn't operate it properly.

Tried it on a friend's laptop, no success

Tried it on a friends PC, worked fine....

Why are computers.....

[KristianGregory]

On a more cheery note, the friend who brought the usb adapter also brought his backup hard disk for testing purposes. Happened to have his music folder on it, and as we exchanged music a few months back, I have successfully recovered my music collection. Hazzah!

[peterb]

I'm glad you got it sorted, but it is strange that it din't work on either your PC or the laptop. There are sometimes issues with 2.5" drives in USB enclosures without an external PSU in that the USB port can't supply enough poer for the drive. (USB ports supply a maximum of 500mA) . Thiis is sometimes overcome by taking poer from the keyboard connector, or having two USB connectors, one just acting as an additional power source.

Hopwever 3.5" drives need more power anyway, so external USB adaptors always (AFAIK) have external power supplies.

Non of which explains why you had these problems. Do other USB devices work OK on the new PC? Presumably yes as you did transfer data across.

The installation process of a USB drive is a two stage process - the firsrt stage is installing the adapter, the seciond is installing the drive connected to the adaptor (this is transparent to the user), so it seems (from what you have said) that it is the second stage that is failing, and Windows can't register the disk, but without delving down into the registry and some of the log files, it is difficult to state why.

[KristianGregory]

The USB adapter provides power to the hard disk directly from the power supply. Other USB devices work fine, including the same usb adapter with a different hard disk connected, no issues. Hard disk works on another PC fine...

So yeah, its just baffling. Will have to see about making a long-term transfer of the data after my exams. Thanks for the help everyone :wave: