Default HD no longer bootable after adding a SSD

caballo · 13 Jul 2014

A new Desktop I purchased came with a WD 1 TB HD with Win 7 Home Premium Installed on it.
Created Recovery Disks
Purchased a 80 GB Corsair SSD
Disconnected WD from Desktop and Installed Win 7 on Corsair 80 GB SSD using Recovery Disks
Connected WD back but booted from Corsair SSD
Western Digital showed capacity as 931 GB in Windows Disk Management program. This was split between various volumes as follows: 16 GB for “Recovery Partition”. This has no volume label. 100 MB with a volume label of “SYSTEM RESERVED”. 457 GB for ACER volume, this has the OS installed. Another 457GB for DATA volume with nothing on it. Made the following changes to this disk: Did a shrink volume on “ACER” and reduced its size to 229.78 GB (size suggested by windows) and gave it a drive letter “Z” and new label - “WD-System”. Formatted the 227 GB space squeezed out of original ACER volume and gave it a label as WD-DATA1 and drive letter “E”. Original DATA volume (457.96 GB) has been given a new label - “WD-DATA2” and drive letter “F”.
After doing all of the above, the WD Drive now shows as “Dynamic” instead of “Basic” and is no longer bootable.
Is there anyway I can make the WD Drive bootable again?

AddRAM · 13 Jul 2014

If you try to make more then 3 primary partitions with windows, your disk will convert to dynamic. I have no idea why windows does this, because you can actually have 4 with windows, Partition Wizard does it no problem.

Didn`t you get a warning message ?

Convert a Dynamic Disk to a Basic Disk

Disk Management does not allow the creation of 4 primary partitions. This is because the MBR partitioning scheme allows at most 4 primary partitions, or 3 primary and 1 extended partition. If you created 4 primary partitions, you would be stuck and would not be able to create any more partitions without deleting an existing one. I believe the only way to create the 4th primary partition in Windows is by using DiskPart from an elevated command prompt, or with Partition Wizard. Or any 3rd party software, I prefer and use PW

You already had 4 primary partitions and when you made the 5th, the disk became dynamic and that`s why it won`t boot, 1st, delete the extra partition you made, and just make it a logical partition, then use Partition Wizard from the SSD to convert the HDD back to basic. If the newest version of Partition Wizard won`t let you, then you`ll have to use version 4.2 from the tutorial. Just download the iso file, burn to cd, then boot from the cd.

ignatzatsonic · 13 Jul 2014

Hmm....you say you've got Win 7 installed on the SSD and can boot from the SSD.

What's the intended purpose for the WD drive? I'm just wondering why you want it to be bootable.

But AddRAM's got it--you need Partition Wizard to get you back to "basic" from dynamic. Dynamic disks are to be avoided at all costs for an ordinary home user. Back up your data first.

gregrocker · 13 Jul 2014

The correct way to uninstall an OS is to always delete its partition in Disk Mgmt. Move the data off your HD, convert it to Basic as shown in tutorial given, delete all partitions and create new Logical data partitions as you please to move the data back in.

AddRAM · 13 Jul 2014

Post a shot of Disk Management after you bring the drive back to Basic.

Then we can tell you what needs to be done to get it booting agagin.

caballo · 14 Jul 2014

AddRAM, gregrocker, ignatzatsonic : Thanks for taking the time to respond back.

Disk Management screenshot is attached.

AddRAM : Step 6 in my original post above was done a while back when I did not pay any attention to what Primary, active, basic , dynamic were. So, I honestly do not remember if I got a warning.
As you can see in the screenshot none of the other partitions are mentioned as primary.
Will Partition Wizard let me convert a disk from dynamic to basic without deleting the exisiting volumes on WD?

ignatzatsonic : Because the SSD is not stable and gives me BSOD often. I will probably post that issue as a new thread. Also, the WD has recovery partition on it which I would like to keep.

gregrocker: I am aware of this method. I was just checking if anyone knows a way to make the WD bootable without having to delete the existing volumes on it.

AddRAM · 14 Jul 2014

You would have to delete that last partition you made up.

Did you read the Tutorial ?

You wanna use Option 1

caballo · 14 Jul 2014

AddRAM : Sorry, I missed the hyperlink in your original post. I am reading the tutorial right now. I will post an update after I try to convert the WD from dynamic to basic.

caballo · 14 Jul 2014

AddRAM : Partition Wizard converted the WD back to BASIC right away, I didn't have to delete the last partition I created on WD. Now all Z:\, E:\ and F:\ partitions show as Primary in Disk Management. I made Z:\ Active.
When I tried to boot from WD, I got the message - bootmgr was missing. So I made Z:\ bootable using EasyBCD. My original WD HardDrive that came with the Desktop is now bootable again.
Thanks a lot for your help. You saved me from deleting the volumes on WD.
Thanks again.

AddRAM · 14 Jul 2014

Awesome, can you post a shot of disk management :)