removed slave hdd, boot error

J

Joe Bogan

New Member
I run windows xp home with 2 hdd, 1 as a master and the other as a slave. I moved all the files off the slave and put them on the master. I removed the slave hdd, changed the jumper on the master to master on, slave off but I get "Disk boot failure, insert system disk and press enter" when i try and boot up even though no system files were ever on the slave. When i connect the slave again it boots up fine.

Why is this and how can I fix it?
 
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You need to remove the drive from Windows. For this, you need Disk Management... and the slave drive installed.
To open Computer Management, click Start, point to Settings, and then click Control Panel. Double-click Administrative Tools, and then double-click Computer Management.
(If this does not show, go to C:\Windows\System32\compmgmt)
Then in the left pane, click Storage -> Disk Management, then right click the slave drive in the right pane. Pick Change Drive Letter and Paths. Then click "Remove".
Shut down the PC and then remove the hard drive. Fix your jumpers. Reboot. Go into your BIOS settings. Even though some PCs have Automatic detection, you should make sure the port that had the slave now says "None". Save, exit, and you should have no problems. This works for me.

Tom
 
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It wouldn't allow me to remove it because it apparently is the system hdd. I used to use it as a master until i got my bigger hdd than uninstalled windows and put it on the bigger one. I noticed however that the slave has the files: ntldr, ntdetect.com and boot.ini (these are the boot files). These files are not on the master hdd (must be why i cant boot without the slave). I thought i couldn't remove the slave because it has an active partition and the master doesnt, so i went into fdisk and changed the only partition on the master to active then on bootup i got a message ntldr was missing. Copied it from winxp cd to master hdd and now i get a message: c:/windows/system32/hal.dll is missing or corrupt. Before i put ntldr on the master hdd it said command.com was missing or corrupt when i tried accessing a windows 98 boot disk to format the slave. The best bit about all this is that when i try to reinstall winxp i get a message from the winxp setup program that the cd isnt a winxp cd even though the program is on the cd. I cant use the format on win98se boot disk because it says the slave is a network drive.

Have i majorly screwed my hdd? (Lucky i backed up :D )
 
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Oh, man. You hadn't formatted the old drive after you moved it to the slave position, so you have system files the PC is still using on it. You've got some files on your master, and some on your slave.
If this were me, I'd pat myself on the back for backing up everything first. Then I'd take out the slave drive, fix the BIOS and jumpers as I said so that your system will have one HD, and start from scratch, booting from the CD. I would not add the slave until everything's all set up and running fine on the master HD. When you DO add it later on, you should format it before you add even one file to it; you can do this through Disk Management.
Tom
 
Nah its all working fine now.
Ran recovery console off the winxp cd. Typed bootcfg /list and there was nothing on the boot list. I then typed bootcfg /rebuild which searched for windows installations. It only found 1, i selected it and checked the bootcfg list again and it was there. It asked me for load selection or something but i just pressed enter.

Thanks again Oven Master.
 
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