Windows XP on SATA II won't start

I used Norton Ghost to copy over my existing IDE drive, which has Windows XP installed on it, onto my new 300gb Maxtor SATA II.

After finishing installing it, I check it on My Computer and everything checks out. I can browse my files and run stuff off it.

So to test it out (I want to make it my new "main" disk, where I keep my OS and programs and use my existing one for data storage), I unplug the existing IDE drive and have only my IDE DVD/CD ROM and the SATA II drives connected.

When I boot up, everything seems to be normal. The XP Logo screen shows up with the loading bar beneath it and then the screen turns blue, the cursor appears and the Windows XP badge appears, in other words, exactly what happens prior to the login screen.

However, at this point it will simply stop. The login screen will never appear. It hasn't frozen per se as I can still move the cursor, but it simply won't proceed to the login screen.

I've tried it again with both the SATA II and IDE drives connected and it works. I even checked the BIOS and apparently the SATA drive is higher than the IDE drive on the boot order.

I really don't know why the SATA drive is freezing up just before the login. Is there any way to fix this?

eta: In case it helps, while booting, during the POST screen, it lists my two hardrives, the IDE drive as IDE 0 and the SATA drive as IDE 2. I've checked the BIOS screen and the SATA seems to be enabled.

 

I forgot to include my hardware details:

My mobo is Gigabyte Technology Co., Ltd. M55S-S3

my harddisks are:

Hitachi HDS721616PLAT80 (IDE Drive, working from IDE Channel 0)
MAXTOR STM3500320AS (SATA II Drive, working from IDE Channel 2)

 

I'm confused, did you copy paste your OS ?

 

No, I used Norton Ghost.

I don't believe any error messages occured, so I'm at a loss as to why it would fail.

 

I would run a clean windows install. But that's just me

 

Hey Chief,
I'm no expert, but my understanding is that most XP installs do not have SATA drivers, hence the OS cannot booth. If your CMOS will support putting the SATA drive into compatible mode, you should be able to boot from it and then switch back once you have recovered.

 

Well it seems it worked after trying another copy using HD Clone. I used the bootable version which allowed me to copy over the contents of my IDE drive onto my SATA one and I'm now running the machine entirely from the SATA drive alone.

Apparently there were read errors, so I'm keping my IDE on standby for a while, in case something goes horribly wrong (which it probably will)