replaced hard drive.. having an issue can someone help?

My friend replaced the hard drive in their dell diminsion 3000. The old hard drive had crashed and she bought a new WD caviar blue to replace it. When she replaced it, somehow the new hard drive is now the E:// drive and she does not have a C: drive. Computer worked fine for a few months. She decided to switch internet providers and went with Wild Blue. The installer came to install the new service and told her that her computer did not have the right program installed to be able to connect to Wild Blue. The installer could not tell her anymore than that and she doesn't know what she needs. But now her hard drive crashed again, will not boot to windows. So she gave me her hard drive to try and get her pictures and files backed up for her. I hooked up the WD hard drive to my computer and was able to access her hard drive and make her copies of all her pictues and docs. The hard drive acted fine in my computer. So installed it back in her computer and turned it on. Computer will now boot into windows. I had to install new drivers for the ethernet ( I am assuming this is what she needed to connect to Wild Blue??)

But my question is why is the hard drive the E: drive instead of C: drive? and How do I fix it or is it going to be a big problem?

Thanks in advance!

 

Which OS is she using, XP?

My guess is it had to do with how she installed Windows on the new HD. If she had the old HD still in place then the installer would have assigned a new drive letter (E: in this case) for the new install. Once the drive letter is set during install it is problematic to change on an OS drive.

The only problem it presents is when a badly written program insists on installing its files on the C: drive rather than determining the proper OS drive letter and putting the files there. Most programs of the last five years will determine the proper letter automatically. A few will not but can be directed to the proper folder. (It is a possibility that Wild Blue has a badly written program needed for its service. But most likely you were correct in that she needed ethernet drivers.)

The only way to get her a C: drive would be to install her OS fresh on the HD.

 

Thanks sach2.

The OS is XP (Media Center Edition 2005). I am pretty sure she had both HD's in at install time, pretty sure she told me she was trying to copy things from old drive to new drive.

I kinda figured that it would not be that big of a problem but wanted to hear it from the experts (Majorgeeks.. ). Thanks!

Can a fresh install be done from her original disks that came with her computer? She has the reinstallation CDs. ( I have actually never done one. ) Does Majorgeeks have a guide for that?

 

With Dell discs it is pretty straight forward. They have one disc labeled Operating System and one disc labeled Drivers (may be more than one but most drivers are on one disc). You disconnect other HD(s) for the install. Boot from the OS disc and install XP. Then when in XP load up the driver disc and it will have about a half dozen drivers that you install one by one. Or you can check the dell support website for more recent drivers that can be downloaded and installed. Usually it will be chipset, video, ethernet and audio drivers that the XP installation misses and have to be installed.

After installation you can reattach the other HD and copy files. This is a Dell guide but it is light on pictures: http://support.dell.com/support/top...cument?&docid=DSN_179256&isLegacy=true#Issue4

****
The problem is that her HD that is working is also the HD she would want to do the new install to. So you would have to do some partitioning to set things up the way you want if she needs to copy data after installation.

You would have to shrink the current E: partition creating space at the front of the drive. Then hide the current E: partition so the installer doesn't know XP is already on the HD. Then install XP in the empty space at the beginning of the drive where it will get the coveted C: letter. After installation you could unhide the E: drive and she could copy what she wanted over. She would have to reinstall any programs she has added since the last XP install.

A bit of work. I've done it several times because I am compulsive and interestingly enough have made the mistake of leaving a second drive attached at least a half dozen times. A compulsive slow learner is apparently what I am. :-D

 

What if she doesn't need to copy any thing from the old hard drive?

Thanks so much for all you help!

Renee

 

If she doesn't need anything off the HD then it is a simple reinstall. It will follow these screens except you will not see screen #5 because you are not using an upgrade disc. http://www.theeldergeek.com/xp_pro_install_-_graphic.htm

Insert the OS CD and when asked where you want to install (screen #6) choose to(D) delete the current partition E:.
That should leave you with just unallocated space and take you back to screen #6. Then this time use (C) to create a new partition (you can just use all available space for simplicity) and continue on to formatting etc.

When installation is complete run the dell drivers disc from windows and install the necessary drivers.

She still will have to reinstall any programs she has added since the new HD was put in place. Program files cannot just be copied but have to be installed in any OS.

 

I just want to say again that running XP from any drive letter is fine in 95% of cases. The only problems would be poorly written programs not installing or trying to troubleshoot and having to translate instructions that refer to C:\Windows\... to E:\Windows\...

XP, itself, has no problems running from a different drive letter than C: (Win98 and below required being installed on C: but XP does not.)

You might just want to keep track of the instructions for reinstall for when you really need to do a fresh install of XP for your friend if she is happy with the way her computer is running. Or find out exactly what the Wild Blue service person said if the ethernet drivers don't solve her problem. I don't see any thing special that Wild Blue requires in their System Requirements.