Boot problem v.2

Chomp

Gawd
Joined
Sep 16, 2003
Messages
547
Here's the problem: When I start my computer and it tries to boot from my HD, I get a message that says "BOOT DISK FAILURE, INSERT SYSTEM DISK AND PRESS ENTER."

Now, I have 2 WD 200GB hard drives, one with one partition, and another with two partitions (one for windows and the other for random stuff). Both are IDE drives.

Recently I bought a Hitachi 250GB SATA drive and I was having some trouble with my computer blue screening and freezing, and I had a hunch it was one of the old drives. So I installed windows on the Hitachi and had two partitions (again one for windows and the other for random stuff). I first created the 'random stuff' partition because I was still using windows on the western digital drive.

Later I made another partition with a higher-letter name than the random stuff partition so that I could install windows. At this point I had the two original WD drives, with partitions C: D: and E: for Windows, Random stuff, and Video. The hitachi drive had a partition for other random stuff which was letter F:. The new windows installation was G: I believe.

Anyhow, I used partition magic to delete and combine the partitions from the orignal WD drive with the original windows and random stuff.



Now when I rebooted, I get the message I posted earlier. I believe this is because the Windows partition is labeled higher than the random stuff partition (G: versus F:) on the Hitachi drive, which is now the only drive with windows on it. I've tried changing the boot priority to the hitachi drive, resetting the CMOS by the jumper, and I can't even boot from CD.


If I didn't confuse the heck out of whoever read this, what did I do wrong???
 
Chomp said:
Anyhow, I used partition magic to delete and combine the partitions from the orignal WD drive with the original windows and random stuff.

If I didn't confuse the heck out of whoever read this, what did I do wrong???

That..........

Your original C: drive had all the boot files for both copies of Windoze.
When you used partion magic to combine the fies you wiped this info.
So your computer now has no info where on where your copie of Windoze is.

The best work around I can think of is to..........

Backup the data you want to keep from the SATA drive.
Disconnect both IDE drives.
Reformat and reinstall Windoze.
Reconnect the IDE drives.

That a long work around but it will put your Windoze drive back to C: with all the correct boot files on it.

Luck............ :D
 
haha...great. Well at least I know what wrong sorta.

However, I did disconnect the IDE drives and I still get the same message. Even when I only allow "boot from CD" I still get that message....


My hardware specs are in the sig sans overclocking
 
Back
Top