how to make windows 7 ignore a bad data drive at startup

Hi ..
this has been a real issue for me over sometime ..

I have my pc configured for music production. I have multiple drives installed (6 in total)

The issue is this :
================

the boot drive where windows 7 is installed is OK , but windows boot process freezes at the startup logo screen and does not go past this stage.

after investigation I found out that when one of the OTHER drives is faulty...
windows does NOT boot ..
if you disconnect the faulty drive .. then windows BOOTS normally.
No message is displayed during the windows startup phase ..

is there a way to configure windows such that It IGNORES the bad drive at startup...
it seems that windows waits for the drive indefinitely and jams there not timing up after some time.

finding the faulty drive is a pain .. you need to disconnect all drives except the boot one.. then connect one after the other .. till windows jams again .. then you know its THAT bad drive ..

you help is appreciated.

John

No.

It's a hardware thing, which a windows layer is trying to sort out.
I've also seen dozens of pc's, in my day, stall if a dvd drive has gone bad.

Here's a preventative maintenance tip I can give you.
Most hard drives (mechanical spinners) don't just suddenly quit. They give warnings. Install Acronis Disk Monitor; it's free.

Invoke it once a week, where it will tell you about each hard drives' health.
If one starts showing signs of failing, ADM will be all over it letting you know.
When a drive gets below 70% health rating, time to take it out of service.

I use these.

Hard Disk Sentinel - HDD health and temperature monitoring

CrystalDiskInfo - Software - Crystal Dew World

Best to get the sick disk outta there before you loose something.

funny thing ,.. these drives are relatively less than a year old ... all sea gate and western-digital ..
this issue happened before with same thing .. I changed the motherboard .. got new drives .. an expensive APC to hold back any bad currents *but it is not a current stabilizer though .. not sure I need to go and put $500 for a monster power station ..* can it be because I have lots of harddisks ??.. I don't see a reason for such a thing ..

A disk is either perfect or it isn`t.

Possibly where you bought it.

AddRAM said:

A disk is either perfect or it isn`t.

No disk is perfect, even right off the line they contain anywhere between 2-10% bad sectors. That number climbs over time and as it does the drive takes longer to boot.