Windows won't boot unless I use a different drive

[VanFinale]

Okay this is a weird problem if I try to set the HDD that I use as the bootable drive in my BIOS all I get is a blinking cursor on a black screen. However if I plug in an old HDD with an old windows installation and set that as the bootable drive I get the boot selection screen and am able to boot into the windows installation on my original hard drive. Anyone know what could be causing this?

 

[GEWB]

OK, see if I understand the conditions:

HD0 + HD1 = boot select for "old Win on HD0" or "new Win7 on HD1"
HD1 alone (now HD0) = no boot

You installed Win7 on HD1 when HD0 was installed. Boot record is on HD0 with Win7 on HD1.

You need to disconnect HD0 and use a Win7 installation CD to "repair" the boot sector on the previous HD1 (now HD0 because the original has been removed).

You might be able to use a partition manager program to make HD1 bootable, then remove HD0 and make HD1 > HD0...not sure if a free program can do it - Brink may know.

Regards,
GEWB

 

[VanFinale]

No actually I installed 7 on HD1 with only it hooked up, then after a while it started giving me that error. So I popped in my old drive so that I could at least boot my computer. When I did that I tried one last time to repair windows which resulted with my other installation popping up on my boot menu with (recovered) next to it.

 

[AddRAM]

Have you ran the repair on the hard drive that`s not booting ?

 

[VanFinale]

Yeah it never completes, it either hangs there forever or says the drive cannot be repaired.

 

[AddRAM]

I think Gregrocker can help you with this problem.

Post a pic of disk management.

 

[DavidE]

Hello and welcome to SevenForums.

I'm not sure i understand either.

It sounds like you can boot the PC with the OLD HD/OS, and the new HD is connected.
If so, you should attach a FULL screen print of the Disk Management window from:
Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Computer Management > Disk Management

I'm not an expert with this but, clarify exactly what happened, what you did, why,...
It sounds like your new HD/OS did work, and now it doesn't...
I assume you don't have a backup image to restore...

gregrocker is among the best and most experienced I've seen on this forum for resolving this type of issue.

regards,
david

 

[VanFinale]

Okay here is the picture of my disk manager, I pointed out which drive is the new drive and which one is the old one.

So here is what happened:

-Installed windows 7 on new HD with only new HD installed
-New HD stopped booting
-Attempted running start up repair, which did not work
-Put in old HD so I can use my old version of windows
-Ran windows repair cd with old HD as main HD it "recovered" the windows installation on my new HD and put it on my boot select screen.
-Could then boot to new HD windows install and it runs perfectly.
-However if I try to boot with new HD my primary drive it won't boot.


Also now trying to run either my bought windows install disc or a new recovery disc made from my windows 7 installation I get an error saying that the recovery disc is not compatible with my installation of windows and does not even give me access to the repair/recovery options.

 

[AddRAM]

You have to mark C: active and then run the startup repair. I would also have it plugged into the 1st sata port.

 

[VanFinale]

I can't mark it as active the option is greyed out, I had it plugged into the first sata port originally but at first I kept switching things around because of the problem and I just never got around to switching it back, do you think it would help at all to have it plugged into the first sata port?

 

[gregrocker]

If it booted when in Disk0 slot it may have stopped booting because when you moved it it was no longer set as first HD to boot. Check now in BIOS setup Boot order. Look also in the Boot order if there is a listing called EFI boot disk which may come into play here. I would move it back to Disk0 slot either way.

You have an EFI BIOS as evidenced by your 100mb EFI boot partition which is only issued when an EFI BIOS is present. This normally means you'll need to follow these special steps to correctly install Win7: UEFI (Unified Extensible Firmware Interface) - Install Windows 7 with - Windows 7 Forums

However it is possible to install to an MBR-formatted HD in an EFI BIOS by removing the EFI boot from BIOS Boot order during install. THere may be other special settings to achieve this in your BIOS. Go to the SUpport Downloads webpage for your model BIOS to read the Manual on this now.

 

[VanFinale]

Okay so the EFI partition was made by my BIOS which I'm not using anymore unfortunately my MOBO malfunctioned so I had to send it away to get repaired/replaced. So should I just leave it as it is now, since I can still use my computer, until I get my proper MOBO back?

 

[gregrocker]

Are you wanting to keep it the way that it is until you receive your EFI mobo back, then reinstall the HD as it was there? If so I wouldn't modify it.

See if you've formatted the HD with GPT instead of MBR. Click on the box to the left of the HD on Disk Mgmt. map to see what the options are. I don't know why you cannot mark it Active.

If you confirm it is MBR HD which is likely since it will boot off of the other HD's boot files, and you don't want to preserve it as is to work on the EFI mobo, then we can help you delete 100mb EFI partition and try to construct in it's place the System Reserved boot partition - by marking it Active then running Startup Repair from disk up to 3 separate times to write the System boot files to the Active partition.

 

[AddRAM]

Well if you still have both drives plugged in, (in order to use the computer) The old hard drive is marked active and that`s probably why you can`t mark the new drive active. It can be marked active with the Partition Wizard Bootable cd. I would take the old hard drive out of the loop when you attempt this. But as you say wait til you get your replacement board, read up, make the partition wizard bootable disc, and read up some more, come back and we`ll be glad to help you out.

http://www.partitionwizard.com/partition-wizard-bootable-cd.html

 

[gregrocker]

Each HD should be able to mark at least one of it's partitions Active, but I concur with AddRAM that it's worth trying with PW CD to mark C Active as it sometimes will do what Disk Mgmt won't.

As long as the HD itself is initialized to be an MBR and not GPT disk then it should work to mark Active so that the System boot files can be written to the Active partition.

 

[whs]

Pretty easy. Just move the bootmgr from the old drive to C: - a 2 minute operation. Forget the EFI partition. http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/209885-bootmgr-move-c-easybcd.html

 

[gregrocker]

I'd try whs's method first since it's easiest. Just install EasyBCD and move the System boot files if they will move. I'm not sure they will move to a partition which cannot be marked Active, though. But try.

 

[VanFinale]

So should I try whs' method now or wait till I get my replacement MOBO?

 

[whs]

Sure go for it. There is nothing to lose. It's no rocket science - 4 clicks total.

 

[gregrocker]

It's up to you. You an wait for the replacement EFI mobo and try to replace everything exactly as it was, or you can try to make the HD bootable now to use on this system.