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I decided, oh I'll hook one of my IDE HDDS up today, because I dont have a massive PSU with a million P2 connectors on it I thought I'd unhook my CD-rom drive (Who needs one if you have a DVD/CD-RW burner combo?) So I unhooked it, cut my hands up hooking the HDD up and rewiring things..... Went to boot my computer, nothing.... I though hmmmm Ram? So I pop my added PC2700 out.... no boot.... ok what did I fry? I Yank the hard drive out..... still no boot..... ok what is wrong here? my parents will kill me if its fried.... so I plug the CD-rom back in just because.... what do you know, boots.... ok.. I Shut it off, unhook CD-Rom drive, it wont boot, but before it blue screens and restarts I quickly plug it in, and low and behold windows loads a second AFTER I plug it in..... can somebody explain to me what the heck this is? I mean..... a CD-rom NOT letting windows boot, does this mean it doesnt like hardware change, or its just a POS? I am really frustrated and irritated that I need to have a CD-Rom drive hooked up to run my OS when I could have another 160 gigs..... Bah!!!!!!! Any ideas?

A fuming Gunny!

I decided, oh I'll hook one of my IDE HDDS up today, because I dont have a massive PSU with a million P2 connectors on it I thought I'd unhook my CD-rom drive (Who needs one if you have a DVD/CD-RW burner combo?) So I unhooked it, cut my hands up hooking the HDD up and rewiring things..... Went to boot my computer, nothing.... I though hmmmm Ram? So I pop my added PC2700 out.... no boot.... ok what did I fry? I Yank the hard drive out..... still no boot..... ok what is wrong here? my parents will kill me if its fried.... so I plug the CD-rom back in just because.... what do you know, boots.... ok.. I Shut it off, unhook CD-Rom drive, it wont boot, but before it blue screens and restarts I quickly plug it in, and low and behold windows loads a second AFTER I plug it in..... can somebody explain to me what the heck this is? I mean..... a CD-rom NOT letting windows boot, does this mean it doesnt like hardware change, or its just a POS? I am really frustrated and irritated that I need to have a CD-Rom drive hooked up to run my OS when I could have another 160 gigs..... Bah!!!!!!! Any ideas?

A fuming Gunny!

Is the BIOS looking for the CDrom?

Some systems will hang at boot because they are looking for a device that has been identified by the BIOS as being in the system and if it cant find it, it will hang. You switched a CD or a hard drive... you may have the system confused. You most go into the BIOS and set things up properly, you cant just swap hardware and have it all work.

Enter the BIOS and disable the CDrom on the IDE channel. Tell it there is no device. Also, make sure in the BIOS the CDrom is not set as the first boot device or the BIOS may look for it and not pass if it cannot find the unit. Once you reboot, shut the system down and install the hard drive then re-enter the BIOS and enable the channel for 'auto' sense.

It should clear the old information and then load the new drive without hanging


It depends on the motherboard and BIOS how that all works.

Let me warn you about something else too... NEVER hot plug a drive.. either the power OR the IDE cable, you will burn up the drive or the I/O controller on the motherboard.

I think it could be that you didn't set up the jumpers on the drives correctly Gunny.

You need to learn about that first.

There are typically two IDE ribbons with 2 devices possible on each ribbon.

The IDE devices must be set to master and slave respectively on each ribbon or they won't work, UNLESS they are set to cable select jumper position!!!!

If cable select is used for both devices on an IDE ribbon, then the device connected to the END position on the cable becomes the master and the device on the inner or halfway position on the cable becomes the slave device.

Some mainboards require that devices, even when manually set to master and slave, follow the convention of the master device being connected to the end position on the cable.

IDE master/slave configurations are CRITICAL and the system will not work correctly if you screw this up.

Wear suitable protective clothing and safety gear Gunny

[quote]I think it could be that you didn't set up the jumpers on the drives correctly Gunny.

You need to learn about that first.

There are typically two IDE ribbons with 2 devices possible on each ribbon.

The IDE devices must be set to master and slave respectively on each ribbon or they won't work, UNLESS they are set to cable select jumper position!!!!

If cable select is used for both devices on an IDE ribbon, then the device connected to the END position on the cable becomes the master and the device on the inner or halfway position on the cable becomes the slave device.

Some mainboards require that devices, even when manually set to master and slave, follow the convention of the master device being connected to the end position on the cable.

IDE master/slave configurations are CRITICAL and the system will not work correctly if you screw this up.

Wear suitable protective clothing and safety gear Gunny

Which reminds me... some standard IDE CDrom cables are NOT true ATA100-133 (80 conductor) compliant so that may also have an affect on using the CDrom ribbon for a hard drive. Even if the jumper is correct he may not get the full speed of the drive if the IDE cable is not rated for it.

Its been a loooooooooong time since I ran a boot IDE drive. Mine are all SATA and SCSI. the last boot IDE rig I ran was in 2000

That's because you are so way ahead of us Nick, most systems out there are still IDE only .

That's because you are so way ahead of us Nick, most systems out there are still IDE only .

Its becase I am an old fart and cant remember things like I use to  ;D

Get in line  :P

Why didnt I think of that? Duh..... I didnt think of the Bios, and I most certainly forgot about the little pin settings, I think because I am running a SATA Hard drive and trying to run an IDE hard drive might also be a problem, The hard drive I believe is set to auto configure itself (Take the device setting pins out) it was used in another system... I've changed hard drives and such before without screwing with the bios before.... picky computer, and dont tell me NOT to plug a hot wire up when its running (I'll do it even more) Besides the fact I have had a few close ones with cars.... (Alternator wires!  ;D) Well I'll check the Bios now and see what it requires........ Cheers, and thanks for the suggestions I am stupid!

Cheers, Gunny

You guys were right, it was the bios.... Made the third boot device disabled and works like a charm, all my lost FS9 data is on transfer to my Main 250 gig drive and then I am formatting this Maxtor 120 gig and sending her to a friend in the UK! Thanks for the help...... This is not the first time you guys have helped me along with my stupidity!  ;D

Cheers, Gunny  ;)

Its becase I am an old fart and cant remember things like I use to

Dang... I thought that was my excuse...... rofl

Is this a case of "we the forgetful" leading the "less experienced"

Dang... I thought that was my excuse...... rofl

Is this a case of "we the forgetful" leading the "less experienced"

babsotutely

or is that absofutely


I cant remember