Boot problems XP

Okay. My brain is tired of trying to figure this out.
Today I put a 500gig HD in my machine.
I removed a smaller 40 gig HD I didn't really use for much. It was out of my old pc.
When I restarted I got this error:
Boot Error B-00
Partition 0 ID=07 (NTFS)
Partition 1 ID=00 (Empty)
Partition 2 id=07 (NTFS)
Partition 3 ID=00 (empty)

So.... if I enter 0 it says NTLDR is missing
if I enter 1 or 3 it just reloads the same error
If I enter 2 it takes me to system recovery for Vista...which I don't have anymore.

If I put the 40 gig back in and change the boot priority back to what it originally was it loads XP.

Here is what the Bios lists for my HD when all 4 are plugged in:L
1st disk = Western Digital (200)
2nd disk = Maxtor 40 gig has an old XP install on it
3rd disk = Seagate 200 gig which has the XP I currently use and the only what that shows up as a listed OS in the boot.ini.
4th disk = Seagate 500 gig

Boot priority must be 1. WSD 2. Maxtor 3. SG(XP) 4. SG for it too boot at all. If I change it to anything else it will not boot at all I will either get the boot error or a vista recovery console.

*Note on my SG with XP there is a second partition that has my vista recovery console on it because that it what originally shipped with my pc, I keep it incase (but it wont work because it can't detect a vista os).

The boot INI says however:
[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(2)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(2)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect


So isn't it essentially saying it is loading windows from the 40 gig Maxtor drive?
How and why is it loading from there and why is it only seeing that install of Xp instead of the one I have on the SG?

I have gotten myself so confused that I can't think straight anymore. Basically I don't want the damn maxtor wasting space in my machine and I can't run a cd drive unless its out of there.

Let me just say that I do NOT have an XP disk anymore because it got broke in half. This system came with vista preinstalled. So I really have no OS on disk if I screw this up.

Yea I'm special. :confused

 

Odd, the rdisk(2) represents the 3rd disk (starts from 0=first disk).

Have you tried removing the 2nd drive, and doing a repair install?

Ah, I see you don't have an XP disk. Was it a retail disk? If so, you should be able to borrow a retail disk from someone then use your XP key, if it asks for it. Same if it was an OEM disk.

Or boot to the recovery console and use:

fixmbr (at your own risk)
y
enter

 

Yeah I know it is odd.
I can't get into recovery console, well I can but it brings up vista recovery console. Which gets me nowhere so I can't even run fixmbr if I wanted too. rolleyes
I guess the only way to fix it is borrow somone elses disk. damn. Just wanted to make sure there wasn't something I was missing and that I hadn't lost my mind. Well I have but still.

 

Mine is too! In order to get my head around what is going on/what you want to do .... please try to keep it simple for me.

May I suggest that you remove all hard drives but one.
(I believe that this will be the 200GB Seagate ... which you say should have XP on it, and which you want to use ?)

Ensure that this is connected as the Primary Master IDE drive (check the cables and HDD jumper settings), and set BIOS to boot from this drive. (Please correct me, if I am at any time you think that I may have the wrong idea about what you want to do.) Please ensure that this drive is detected and reported correctly in BIOS. Do you have this set to "Auto detect" in BIOS? Do you have the HDD mode set to "Auto" for this drive? If you have answered yes to both these questions ... fair enough. But just for the purposes of this exercise, I would like you to change the BIOS settings for these two, to "Manual" and "LBA" respectively. Save the changes and Exit your BIOS to restart.

Does your machine now boot normally. What happens ? .... all details please.
Please, if you get any error messages, report them exactly, and details of exactly at what stage in the boot process they appear.

Depending on what has already happened: If Windows doesn't boot normally, try safe mode. What happens ?

If Windows doesn't boot into Safe Mode, try "Last known configuration that worked". What happens ? If it doesn't work, try that again ... and again ... if necessary .... What happens ?

Are there only the two partitions on the Seagate 200GB drive? Are you sure that the "second partition ... vista recovery console" is indeed just a recovery console and NOT a fully restorable backup ("restore to factory condition") version of Vista? What size is this partition and what size is the data contained in it?
---------------
These do seem silly questions to have to ask:
1. Are you sure there is an XP operating system on the 200GB Seagate?
2. Are you sure that you have been using the Windows OS on the Seagate and not the Maxtor?
Oh, I just hate to have to ask .... I really do not want to complicate things, but I just have to ask ....

 

Hi okn0tok,

There's a jumper (small plastic piece that sits down on medal pins) on the new 500 GB hard drive. move the piece to the other setting (ie: if set to master, move to slave and visa versa.

reboot

Techsent

 

I will give it a shot, and let you know the results but I will answer some of the other questions you had first.

The Vista recovery partition is about 7 gig although I cant find anything on it other than two files that only equal a few megs and yes it is set to show hidden files so I have no idea why the folders report over 7 gigs of info inside it. It should have been a full system restore.

Well of the SG (200) yes it is XP and yes it is the one I use it is the one that holds my user data, files and ect. It is the one that is running windows.

I looked at the maxtor and it does not contain any of the data such as users and my documents in its old windows folders so I do not believe it is the one it is booting too.

OK I will go ahead and pull the other three drives and check the bios settings and give it a shot. Thanks so much fore the good ideas (can't believe I didn't think of that...well I sorta did but was much to lazy to try it unless I had to)

 

okay this is seriously the weirdest thing I have ever seen. I tried booting in every possible configuration with the hard drives and this is what I got:

1. Maxtor 40g = ERROR: Disk boot failure enter system disk and press enter.

2. WDS 200g = ERROR - Windows couldn't start because of configuration problem. Couldn't read from selected boot disk. Check booth path and hardware. Check windows configuration manuals.

3. SG 200 = ERROR
Boot Error B-00
Partition 0 ID=07 (NTFS)
Partition 1 ID=00 (Empty)
Partition 2 id=07 (NTFS)
Partition 3 ID=00 (empty)

4. SG 500 = ERROR
Boot Error B-00
Partition 0 ID=07 (NTFS) If I select this I get NTDLR missing
Partition 1 ID=00 (Empty)
Partition 2 id=07 (NTFS) If I select this I get vista recovery
Partition 3 ID=00 (empty)

Combined drives listed in boot order:

WDS & SG200 = ERROR - Windows couldn't start because of configuration problem. Couldn't read from selected boot disk. Check booth path and hardware. Check windows configuration manuals.

SG200 & WDS = ERROR - Boot Error B-00
Partition 0 ID=07 (NTFS) If I select this I get NTDLR missing
Partition 1 ID=00 (Empty)
Partition 2 id=07 (NTFS) If I select this I get vista recovery
Partition 3 ID=00 (empty)

WDS & Maxtor = ERROR - Windows couldn't start because of configuration problem. Couldn't read from selected boot disk. Check booth path and hardware. Check windows configuration manuals.

Maxtor & WDS = ERROR - Windows couldn't start because of configuration problem. Couldn't read from selected boot disk. Check booth path and hardware. Check windows configuration manuals.

WDS - Maxtor - sg500 = Error Windows could not start because of missing hal.dll.

WDS, Maxtor, SG200 = WINDOWS STARTS.


There is no way to start in sfe mode or recovery mode or anything else it boots straight to these errors except when I get the Boot Error 00, I can select partition 2 and it will boot me into Vista recovery program which looks like it can install a complete copy of vista (which I hate and would rather have no computer at all).

What I am thingking at this point: Because the configuration of WDS - Maxtor - Sg200 boots windows...
THe WDS? I have no idea its role in this... part of it has something to do with the windows config. perhaps it actually holds my MBR. Maxtor has the NTLDR file that SG 200 is missing. SG200 has the hall.dll that maxtor is missing.

Somehow these three systems manged to locate eachother missing data and rely on one another to boot me into windows xp.

Is this possible?

 

Exactly where are you getting the above information presented?
-------------------
I would like you to replace your hard drives and reconfigure BIOS such that you can boot and load Windows.

Then use Windows Explorer to navigate to the Seagate 200GB/Windows OS partition, and locate the "boot.ini" for that OS.
Please Open with a text editor (notepad) and copy the content to another text file and save it, and report what you find.

It should look like this:

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect /NoExecute=OptIn

So, if it doesn't look like this, please replace what you see with the above and save it as such, so that you will have now changed the boot.ini file contents.

Now, follow my directions in my previous post, namely:

Let us know what happens.
--------------
It may very well be helpful to us if you supply the details:
1. mobo manufacturer and model
2. BIOS maker and version (from the screen when you enter BIOS setup menu).

 

Sorry I had the whole computer crash finally and the WDS drive no longer works. I got an XP disk from someone and got it running, remember when you said it sounded like some kind of raid issue? Well turns out that this machine was set up exactly that way. It was hell but it was fixed. Thanks for your help.

 

Very pleased to see you are back up and running again. That wasn't a very pretty "fix", but you got there in the end.

Thank you for posting with news of the outcome.
Best of luck.