Here is an odd one for ya!

[ElementalWindX]

Anyone ran across this before?

Computer will NOT boot to the hard drive at all without ANY form of cd in the cd drive.

If you turn on the computer with nothing in the cd drive, it goes past the dell logo, then you get a blinking cursor.


Put any form of cd into the cd drive, and it will boot to the hard drive perfectly.



I have tried various cdroms. I've tried completely removing the cdrom, I've tried switching sata ports. I've reinstalled the OS with a completely new hard drive (it did have root kits and tons of viruses on it). I've swapped memory. I've updated the bios to the newest release. I've stripped every pci/video card out of this thing.

Nothing I know of seems to fix this weird little issue. Does anyone know of a fix? It's a Dell E521 desktop with Windows Vista.

 

[Steve202]

I've tried switching sata ports.

Did you try replacing the cables when you switched the ports? I've seen bad sata cables do really weird and wonderful things.

 

[ElementalWindX]

It's a Dell E521 desktop with Windows Vista.

I have not tried to use different sata cables yet. I will try that next.


It's set as auto detect where ahci/raid would be.


*edit*

There is no auto detect on the ahci/raid. It's just either raid on or off. It's been off. I swapped with a known good sata able. I have an endless amount of never used cables.

Nothing seems to work. I'm going to attempt to turn raid on and see if that fixes it.

 

[lan101]

This isn't any help to this situation, but I remember an old hp desktop that a customer had. If you restarted the machine, it would stay stuck on the main blue hp screen. From there you had to manually power it down and then turn it on and it would work fine.

I never did figure out what caused it.

 

[Majestic]

Check the boot order, perhaps remove the cd rom from the boot order itself. Given that you have tried other cd roms and swapped out the cables I'm thinking it may be a bios issue itself.

Also if the cd rom is an IDE model and not sata, make sure it's not on cable select.

Alternatively, I would shut down the computer and REMOVE The power cable then hold the power button for about 10 seconds then press it a few times before reconnect the power cable and restarting the machine. Perhaps it has an old electrical short causing this behaviour?

Majestic

Anyone ran across this before?

Computer will NOT boot to the hard drive at all without ANY form of cd in the cd drive.

If you turn on the computer with nothing in the cd drive, it goes past the dell logo, then you get a blinking cursor.


Put any form of cd into the cd drive, and it will boot to the hard drive perfectly.



I have tried various cdroms. I've tried completely removing the cdrom, I've tried switching sata ports. I've reinstalled the OS with a completely new hard drive (it did have root kits and tons of viruses on it). I've swapped memory. I've updated the bios to the newest release. I've stripped every pci/video card out of this thing.

Nothing I know of seems to fix this weird little issue. Does anyone know of a fix? It's a Dell E521 desktop with Windows Vista.

 

[mraikes]

Anyone ran across this before?

Computer will NOT boot to the hard drive at all without ANY form of cd in the cd drive.

If you turn on the computer with nothing in the cd drive, it goes past the dell logo, then you get a blinking cursor.


Put any form of cd into the cd drive, and it will boot to the hard drive perfectly.



I have tried various cdroms. I've tried completely removing the cdrom, I've tried switching sata ports. I've reinstalled the OS with a completely new hard drive (it did have root kits and tons of viruses on it). I've swapped memory. I've updated the bios to the newest release. I've stripped every pci/video card out of this thing.

Nothing I know of seems to fix this weird little issue. Does anyone know of a fix? It's a Dell E521 desktop with Windows Vista.

I had the exact same problem with a Dell E1505 in '09 and fixed it, but unfortunately my job notes from that day aren't clear on how.

I recall some systems having problems with master/slave settings on drives. You might make sure the CD is cable select (or slave?) and not the master.

 

[ElementalWindX]

Everything on it is sata. There is a pata port, but nothing in the computer is using it. :/

I have played with the boot order. Nothing changes

 

[BillMoney]

Did you try booting with no cd drive attached at all and did that work?

 

[EAGtech]

It could be that the hard drive is not spinning up fast enough and the cd being in the drive delays the boot just long enough for the hd to get up to speed.

 

[Rosco]

There is nothing wrong with the drive. The partition with widows is not active. If you have a herins cd you can use one of the dos options to set the active partition. I have seems this a few times. If you can boot into windows with the hep of a live cd this is definitely the problem!

 

[ElementalWindX]

Ok. I apologize, you all are going to laugh at me. I'll admit mistakes. I've been awake since 3am taking care of my son and I guess I simply just needed more sleep.

I stopped and really sat here and thought about it for a minute and went back into the bios to the boot order and on the screen it shows hard drive at the top of the list, and cdrom below it.

BUT..

here it is...

If I was to actually stop and read the paragraph above all that mess, it says you can press the space bar to deactivate/activate it, and it went as such:

Hard drive
1. CDROM
2. Blahblah
3. Blahblah

so I hit space on the hard drive and bingo... I win.

Now it shows:

1. Hard drive
2. CDROM
3. Blhablhablha

and now it boots...

Still makes no sense why in the hell would the computer boot to the hard drive ONLY IF a cd of any kind was in the cdrom, when the hard drive is "deactivated" from the boot menu?

I'm going to go home now and go to bed.... *sigh*