MBR Problem.

[itSaviours]

Just a thought, but is the partition on the Hard drive a boot partition ?

When you get into windows, goto Computer Management, Disk Management, look at your drive, it should say its a Boot, Page File, Primary Partition.

 

[red12049]

OK I just did a clean install of windows on a dell system from a dell system disc. Every thing went without a hitch and then all drivers were installed and the computer was updated to SP3 and such.

Now here is where the problem is... The computer will only boot to windows if the Dell System CD is in the drive.
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Here is what I know:

1.) Both CD and DVD are SATA and both are connected SATA0 and SATA1 with 0 being the hard drive and 1 being the DVD

2.) The BIOS is Set to Boot to the Hard Drive First

3.) The computer comes up with the prompt: :"Boot From CD:"
no matter what CD is in the drive.

4.) If you put in a Widnows Disc you with get the frist prompt "Boot to cd:" which I believe is actually coming from the boot sector of the hard drive and then it will try to boot from the CD-ROM this is will display the Windows Disc prompt Press any key to boot from CD.

5.) If there is not a Windows Disc in the drive you will get No boot Device Deteceted, Insert system disk..
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What I have done....

I have booted to recovery console and run fixmbr, fixboot, and I have rewritten the boot.ini file and none of those fixed the problem even though they ran properly.

I am at a loss of things to try... I am sure that is something that my foggy head is missing but I can't seem to think of a different approach.

What suggestions do you guys have?

Thanks
Phil




2.)

In the old days, I would have said there are no system files on the hdd. XP usually takes care of all that by itself.

Is there still a Dell recovery partition on the hard drive? If so, partitions may be confused. Also check to see if the drive has an active, primary boot partition.

Rick

 

[wiro]

was the original system saved and restored using an image program?

 

[snifferpro]

How many hard drives are physically installed in the machine?

What type of hard drives are they - IDE or SATA?

 

[PC Ops]

How many hard drives are physically installed in the machine?

What type of hard drives are they - IDE or SATA?

1.) Both CD and DVD are SATA and both are connected SATA0 and SATA1 with 0 being the hard drive and 1 being the DVD

Did you get any further this weekend, Mushin?

 

[wiro]

HDD's are so unreliable! We tend to run chkdsk and ensure good backups in place, and replace that drive when *disk* appears in evts or when it falls over on normal desktop pc's.

 

[PC Ops]

Mushin, will you be so kind to tell us te outcome?

 

[Shark]

This most certainly sounds like a bios problem. If you cannot toggle enough options in the bios to get the correct outcome, you may need to update the BIOS.
The reason I say this is because I had a similar situation on a custom pc I built. All SATA drives. I had to update the BIOS before it would boot the hard drive.
Computers are funny sometimes.