Can't boot with USB My Book connected

Hi all,

I have a Dell Dimension 9100 running XP sp3 all updated.

Yesterday I installed a 2gb WD My Book external hard drive… for backups mostly. It is USB 3 but I only have USB 2 straight off the MoBo so that’s how it’s connected USB 3 from the drive into USB 2 on the CPU box. The drive is externally powered.

Installed OK and works fine: backing up, reading, writing to the drive no problem. Have forced it to come up with the same drive letter each time so the back up software can always find it.

BUT when I reboot the system with the USB drive powered up, the system hangs just after the Windows splash screen. If I switch the drive off before the boot up, all works fine and I can then switch on the drive once in Windows then everything is normal. But it’s annoying to have to do these couple of extra things every time I want to turn on the machine.

I have checked that the bios isn’t trying to boot from the USB drive and it isn’t, and I would have thought if it was I wouldn’t get as far as the Windows splash screen anyway.

Any ideas I can try?

Thanks in advance

Dins

 

Which Windows version, SP level and antivirus are you using?

Did the MyBook install the virtual CD/DVD and encryption software?

 

XP sp3 all up to date already stated so I'm not sure what else i can tell you about the OS. AVG is the anti virus.

Not that I am aware of. Why would it install this software on a external hard drive?

There was no CD that came with the drive. On detection it loaded the driver from the Windows install wizard. I allowed the wizard to look online but don't know where the driver actually came from.

Thanks for your interest.

 

I'm assuming this is your Mybook version. If my assumption is correct, you probably have the encryption and virtual CD (VCD) already installed. This software/firmware can, and does, cause problems with 'normal' Windows tools because of the 'hidden' way that it operates; sometimes this leads to what looks like, and might actually be, complete data loss.

If you visit the WD page on disabling/updating this 'feature', you'll see:

If you then read on and click on the Windows 7 ... XP link to show more details, you'll then see:

Ok, back to your current scenario and a few more assumptions :
Your antivirus has a boot-time module which is set to scan for anomalies during the early part of the XP boot up process; this is looking at the software that's being loaded for the VCD and encryption modules and probably also doing a quick scan for rootkit-like activities (potentially risky/malware files/drivers that are loading but are 'hidden' from normal Windows tools). Before these WD drivers are loaded, some of the files on the MyBook may well look like they could be a rootkit. This is where I see your boot hang arising from.

I see 3 'easy' routes to 'fix' this:
#1, if you wish to make use of the encryption, etc. available from the use of the WD tools, don't connect the MyBook until after XP has booted.
#2, disable the boot-time detection routine in the antivirus, this will make you a somewhat more vulnerable to malware infection.
#3, disable and uninstall all WD tools that interfere with normal Windows tools, with a little luck, this will leave you with the equivalent of your current WD MyBook but without the Smartware software and features.

 

Cheers

yes that is the model... your link also found me a driver which may or may not have been loaded but I will reload in case.

Will work through your suggestions ASAP, which means probably not for the next 48 hours... since I have deadlines and a wedding aniversary to negotiate!

thanks again.

 

Re: Can't boot with USB My Book connected: SOLVED

update

Turns out that the VCD wasn't installed, but I went ahead and installed it, then updated the softeware via the website and also updated the firmware for the drive.

It went smoothly and now boots fine everytime... can't seem to work out how to disable the vcd though: the instructions describe a button that doesn't exist on my software. But now it all works I'm not bothered.

thanks again for the guidance.