Booting From Different Hard Drives
Mar 20, 2007
I think I have a simple question....maybe not. All I want to do is boot to XP home located on different drives, one older, one newer but both with SP2Just built new computer (first time builder) I installed three hard drives, drive H is a new boot disk with XP home, drive C is a storage disk from old computer and disk L is the older boot disk with XP home (reformatted within the past year). The MB assigned the drive letters, not me.H and C are slave and master on Primary IDE, L is Master attached to a PCI card.I want to boot from L. Boot sequence does not recognize L but it does offer the option of booting from OTHER DEVICE so I disable all drives (including H,C and two dvd drives) but it still boots to the new H drive.The bios does not recognize drive L (I guess cause its attached to the PCI card?). My thinking is that if I set up L directly to MB and switch one of the DVD drives to the PCI card it will work.If I do that then I think the MB will recognize drive L and allow me to set it up in the boot sequence the same way that the new drive works.I don't know what I should worry about BUT I am sure that I don't know what will go wrong.
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Dec 30, 2008
I was wondering if there is any way to boot my new Windows XP computer off of an old Windows 98 Hard Drive without screwing anything up. What I am trying to do is access and run a program that was installed on the WIN 98 Hard Drive. The software was an expensive Patent Software and I no longer have the installation disk.Here is what I have already tried:1. Connected the WIN98 hard drive to my XP Computer and booted up. Computer started to boot into WIN98 but came back with some kind of memory error and shut down.2. Tried running the software from the WIN98 Drive in WINXP but came back with an error about missing DLL files.Someone mentioned running the drive as a virtual machine.
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Jan 12, 2007
I was working on the computer yesterday when it froze up on me. I didn't think much of it, so I rebooted and continued what I was doing. Later that same day, the computer locked up about 2-3 more times. Then I started hearing ticking noises coming from inside. I shut it off after it froze again. When I powered it back on, the screen during bootup that displays my Hard drive's status (I have four HDs, paired up with one another), says that the first set of hard drives (which is where the OS is on) is healthy, and on the other set, it gets an error with red text. I rebooted, and sure enough, they were both healthy again.
This is where it messes up. It starting loading the Windows logo, with the progress bar. The next thing it does is go black. It doesn't boot at all after that. I have to reboot everytime. I then tried to boot in safe mode. Black screen again. I tried all the possible options in the boot menu, none of them worked. That's where my first problem takes off. So I now have a non-booting OS. The next thing I do is insert the Windows boot disk, and installed Windows XP on the same HD the original OS was on (Don't ask why, I don't know either). After the installation, Windows booted up fine, except I was running on a fresh install. Which how I'm on this site...........
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Sep 8, 2007
I have a computer at home with two identical 160 GB WD SATAII drives in it and I want a copy of XP on each drive. The first drive (Which I have been using as my gaming computer) has already got XP installed and I want to keep it pretty much free of anything but games so it won't affect performance. On the second drive, I would like to install another copy of XP and use this drive for my common use and with the primary intent of using it for a HDTV capture device. I've researched it for a while and have almost only been able to find information concerning dual booting with IDE drives using a jumper switching device so you don't have to dismantle the computer every time you switch drives.
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May 10, 2007
I want to reformat my computer, so i put one of my cd rom drives as top priority, inserted cd and restarted. Everything was fine until then, until when i press 'enter', and it says : 'no hard drives were found on this computer, setup cannot complete' or something along those lines.
I then looked for help on the internet, found that for SATA drives, you need to have the drivers on a floppy disk....
However, i do not have a floppy disk reader
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Aug 14, 2007
Currenlty got an issue where i have a user who wants to dual boot with Vista and XP using sata disks.The general rule of thumb when doing dualbooting is to install the oldest operating system first, and then gradually work your way up.The way it will be setup is as so Vista - Primary partition of the 1st disk
XP - Primary partition of the 2nd disk.Now, The way i was thinking of doing it was to install XP first, then install Vista, And modify the boot.ini to find the entry for XP.Is there any difference in modification of the boot.ini file when using sata drives, and is there any difference when making mods in Vista (As i have only edited the boot.ini in XP)
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Feb 24, 2008
So I'm using my a8n-sli premium motherboard and have been just using 1 sata hard drive using Windows XP for about a year. I bought a second sata hard drive last week and installed Vista on it.I just can't figure out the correct boot.ini for this to work,I get an missing NTLD message, when I try to boot from Vista, but the XP one works with that configuration.I can boot off the Vista one fine if I set it in the bios boot order to come up before the XP hard drive, so the drive and the OS are fine
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Mar 4, 2008
I had to do an reformat on my PC. Before the reformat, my PC read both my external hard drives no problem. Then after the reformat, it only would read one. When I would restart with both connected, it wouldn't budge from the welcome screen. After I would unplug the "questionable" one, it would then allow me to log in as usual. I think it could be a driver issue but I'm not totally sure because it does read it after a little while. I changed the USB cable, so for now, it is holding. Can anybody figure out what it might be?
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Oct 10, 2008
I just installed a 320gb I had around in a spare PC. I was reading up on jumping everything and understood that I should set the main HD as master and the spare HD as slave on the primary IDE connector, then set my DVD drive as CS on the secondary.My problem is that the master and slave connectors on the ribbon cable aren't long enough to reach both drives.(only places the drives will fit) So I hooked everything up CS while I put the main HD on the primary IDE and then hooked the DVD and spare drive on the secondary IDE. Everything seems to work fine and I can see both drives and everything, but on bootup I have to go into the boot menu and pick the main HD to boot. Is it safe to run everything this way? And if so how do I fix the booting issue?
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Jan 15, 2005
Anyways I want to make My MAXTOR my main Hard drive I set it up as a master and Seagate as slave, however when i do so it doesn't boot from the MAXTOR, i used MAXBLAST 3 to set it as a boot drive and it went haywire is it possible to set them both as Bootdrives, backup my files to the 40gig install XP Pro on the MAXtor move my files from 40 to 80gig and then format the 40 gig.If you did not understand this is what i want/Have
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Mar 28, 2006
I have recently re-installed Windows xp and all is fine with that operating system, but the problem that I do have is.I have two hard drives but only one is showing up. I know it is still there somewhere, but how do I make it available to use?
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May 31, 2006
I am having a small problem. I have an old server, a Compaq Proliant 1600. I have had it for about 2 years, and today I finally decided to work on it. I added some more RAM, and installed Windows XP. It has six 9.1 GB Hard Drives, but it only recognizes the one hard drive that the OS is on. That is the only drive that will show up when ever I go to My Computer. My question, how do I get the other 5 hard drives to show up?
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Jan 18, 2007
I'm in the process of building a new computer to replace my old AMD 2800+ system. I would like to use one of my old hard drives that has all my files and programs on it without having to do a complete reformate and fresh install of winxp. Is this possible? and how do I go about doing this?
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Aug 8, 2007
I have filled my other hard drive with so much junk that it won't even load up anymore, and so it just doesn't come on and it was windows xp. Does any body know how I would wipe, or reformat it? One last question, I have another hard drive, its empty and I don't think its formatted. If I were to use it as the primary hard drive and use my XP boot cd, would it install?
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Sep 1, 2010
where can I find the location of my Hard-Drive Partitions? I don't mean as in My Computer and double click, Microsoft Windows XP Professional Backup" /noexecute=optin. That sort of data, so I can add my windows 7 OS to the Boot Screen.
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Aug 28, 2005
Is there any way to partition a hard drive in two without having to reinstall the OS? Do I have to buy a seperate program to do it? Or does Windows include some sort of utility that does it?
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Jun 4, 2006
only 1 user, 33 processes, ewido and adaware SE scanned free -- but simply opening a word doc made the system hang over and over. Found I could open and print by running Word and opening the files from the 'open file menu' -- did this 12 times, fine. But try to double-click the same file that just printed -- hangs (and same for other files e.g. image files). the Folder showed on two lines in TaskManager Applications ''Not responding'' and no other applications; I did try cleaning registry ist time ever in nearly 4yo computer, restart seemed fine. But still hung on any particular file even with other applications (ie not just Word). Defragged but no better. Then thought of ChkDsk....It asked for restart to access certain windows files......now I canot tell whether CHKDSK is doing something or its just stuck in failing to boot.
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Aug 3, 2007
basically I need to know how to make a pc boot from the HD and install XP by copying the XP CD to the HD. Details & reason below:I've formatted the hard drive on a a friends emachine (by putting the HD into my machine) due to mess with viruses etc.Put HD back into e machine and tried to install XP from an OEM XP CD (genuine windows) - it boots and starts install, copying files to the hard drive fine but when it reboots it doesn't continue the install, but just goes back to the start, wanting to copy the files again.So what I'm going to do is put the HD back in my machine, copy the XP CD to a partition on the HD and then put it back in the machine, boot from HD and install XP all from HD. Question is- how do I get it to boot from the hard drive and start the install?I don't have a floppy boot disk or a floppy drive on my machine to make floppy boot disk. I can set the machine to boot from the HD 1st, that's no problem, just don't know how to set up the HD to let it boot from that so I can run the windows install which will be on the partition on the HD.
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May 4, 2008
I live with went on a rampage and felt like throwing my desktop around. Anyways, when I go to boot it up and use the Boot disc (XP Home Edition) It goes through but says it can't find the hard drive. Can someone please tell me how to fix this. I know how to open the case of my computer and everything.
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Oct 24, 2006
Windows XP SP2.I have recebtlky suffered from various Malware and suddenly I have a message Invalid boot.ini booting from C:windows.When I try to recover from CD I get a message that it doesn't recognise the hard drive. Theerefore no restore. I can use my PC but it will re-boot sporadically.
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Feb 28, 2005
Problem with low disk space on the 1st of 2 hard drives. This hard drive is only 4 GB, and is my master drive. I have moved as many files as I possibly can to the second (larger) hard drive, without uninstalling and reinstalling all my programs.
Is there any way to simply get any "overflow" to "fall into" the other drive.
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Mar 21, 2008
everytime i start my pc i get the following message:
error auto-sensing primary hard disk drive 0 strike the f1 key to continue, f2 to run the setup utility.
when i push f1 the same message will pop up.if i go into the setup utility and look at the primary drive 0 it says hard drive.it stands on auto but it doesnt show the capacity.
the same thing with the secondary rive 1.i have 2 hard drives.1 with 20 gig and the second 1 with 250 gig.both arent recognized by my pc.i cant format the pc cause i dont have hard drives to install xp on >.<
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Apr 26, 2007
I have a computer running Windows XP PRO SP2 with 2, 250gb hard drives. The operating system and programs are on the C drive and the second drive which is removable is supposed to be for my data, but Windows doesn't recognize it so I can't use it. Right now I have my data on an external hard drive, connected by USB.
The second hard drive is new from my manufacturer (I have a custom computer and this is a replacement hard drive--the original was faulty) and I haven't put anything on it yet. When I first put it in my machine, I was able to see it in "My Computer". The next day when I was ready to start copying my data over, it was nowhere to be found. I turned off the machine, pulled out the drive and put it back and rebooted--still no show.
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Mar 29, 2007
Can you have more than one copy of XP on the same computer with two hard drives, that can be validated please.
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Sep 23, 2006
I have transferred a Hard Drive into another computer and thought I had to re-install Windows (XP Home) - this I did.In so doing I created another Folder - Windows2 so as not to overwrite anything. I have a Windows folder as well.I also still have a Windows98 Folder on this drive.I cannot access the latest e-mails in the new configuration - or anything else for that matter and know that I am going to have to reinstall all programs.How and where do I find those missing e-mails, or can I uninstall this new version and revert to the old one?
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Dec 5, 2006
I was hit by a virus and now I can't access my hard drives from My Computer. I get a message "Windows Script Host" and "cannot find script file, "C:autorun.vbs" when I click on my "C" icon. Right clicking gives me gibberish in the menu box where the "Open" should be. I can still get through to the contents via My Documents and up-leveling.
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Oct 30, 2006
Is there any way I can be given a choice of which Hard Drive I can startup on when I turn on my computer if I put 2 individual Hard drives in it?If there is, I will purchase another copy of XP but I need to know before going to the expense of buying another XP operating system.
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Jul 23, 2003
Is it possible to dual boot between to different hard drives both running Windows XP? I just bought a new hard drive and I want to install it on the same machine and have a drive just for me and my wife and the kids can have their own. They down load so much stuff and cause the system to boot and run so slow. I'm tired of restoring it just to find 2 weeks later it's like it was.
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Dec 4, 2005
I have an HP Pavillion zv5000.Windows xp sp2.I was online and the laptop and got a blue screen of death
don't recall exactly what it said, something about ie encountering an error and needing to shut down.Went to reboot, and it tried to boot off of LAN.checked my BIOS everything seemed fine, disabled that boot option.
Tried to reboot again, got a plashing flat cursor in upper left hand corner.Tried to use Norton Disk, scanned memory only.Did not scan boot.Tried to use XP disk to repair, and it came up with screen saying that
it could not find any hard drives on this computer.What happened to me, is it viral, or hardware.This laptop is only a year old, but no longer under warranty.
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Oct 20, 2009
I'm having a problem with a laptop that will not boot up.
Lenovo 3000 C100
Windows XP Home
After powering it it up it seems like it does not recognize that the hard drive is there so XP does not boot. No error message. It brings up a Boot Device menu screen with the options to boot from Floppy (does not have one), HardDisk (does not work), CD-ROM or PXE. Choosing HardDisk does not work.
In the BIOS screen the hard disk has the status: "Disable" and there does not seem to be a way to change that. In the BIOS boot sequence the hard disk appears as it should. I've tried reordering the sequence but it makes no difference
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Apr 30, 2009
Every 3-4days my computer would freeze up while booting up at windows XP screen and scroll bars would freeze.What bohers me about this is i am sure what could be causing this. I use avg as my antivirus,and run A2, spybot,regcleaner, tweaknow on a weekly basis. I keep my system really clean, so now i am wondering is it my HD. PC: Win XP-PRO, 800MHZ AMD Athlon, 1024mb,80gHD. I did what cleaning i could in safemode, it still freeze on scroll bars. I tried last good config, result is the same. The last time i got pass the freezing was by doing a restore.
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