randomly disappearing slave drives


  1. VJBenz
    Posts : 8
    Windows 7 Professional 64-bit
       New #1

    randomly disappearing slave drives


    Hi. I've read the posts on this topic, and mine shares elements but differs. I have had a new machine built for me with an ASUS mother board and running Windows 7 Professional 64-bit. My previous one had Windows XP Professional and the adjustment has not been easy.

    Using "My Computer/Computer Management/Storage/Disk Management"; the following always shows up:
    Disk 0 Internal Main Drive C: 2TB with Windows 7 Professional
    Disk 1 internal SATA slave drive E: 150GB (ex Dell machine HDD, partition removed and reformatted)
    Disk 2 internal SATA slave drive F: 185GB (ex Sony machine HDD, partition removed and reformatted)
    Disk 3 external USB back-up drive G: 2TB Western Digital My Book 1130

    I have always been in the habit of shutting down my machine when it is not in use. This is primarily because I live in the country, and power bumps are quite common. I believe this is what killed my last machine.

    THE PROBLEM:
    Whenever I start the machine, Disks 1,2,3 always show up in Computer Management , but not always in Windows Explorer. I am usually missing at list one, and often two of the drives. It seems to change randomly. I re-start, and get a different configuration. About one in ten start-ups, all drives appear, and function normally.

    I will try switching SATA drive cables. One poster suggested that the main drive needs to be either disk 1 or disk 2, and slave drives should be disk 3 & disk 4.

    Anyone have any other thoughts?

    PS I don't have my new machine specifics handy since I am wiorking from another machine. I'll update that tonight.

    Thanks in advance....

    Vic
      My Computer
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  3. VJBenz
    Posts : 8
    Windows 7 Professional 64-bit
    Thread Starter
       New #2

    Well, the journey is finally over. It was the WD backup drive that was the problem. It worked fine in the XP environment, but bogged everything down in the Windows 7 environment. I tried many hotfixes and other suggestions to no avail. When I finally opened the WD external drive using another XP machine, removed the Password Protection, and completely reformatted the drive, removing all WD software, the Windows 7 machine began behaving as it should.

    Vic
      My Computer
    Quote Quote

 

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