Windows Doesn't Start - Dieing Drive?

Basically, if my data drive is connected windows doesn't start, and I want to know if the drive could be dead. It gets stuck on the page that says "Starting Windows." My OS is win7, I use avast and comodo. I have windows on one hdd. I have another hdd that before I was using to hold all my data.

My PC started acting weird, all partitions on the data hdd would disappear then windows would crash. Sometimes it wouldn't start with the data drive connected, sometimes it would. It worried me, so I decided to backed up just about everything from the data drive to an external drive.

Now the computer won't get past that screen at all if the data drive is connected.

I've tried running the Malware Removal Guide up to (and including) running Malwarebytes Anti-Malware (without the data drive connected, as I can't get to windows if it is connected). I have no new hardware. I tried a stress test, went for an hour and was completely fine. I have logs/results of those if needed, but they're clean.

My question is: could the data drive be dieing or dead? If not then how do I fix it so windows will start with it?

 

Could be a conflict with 2 anti-virus programs. You may need to use a tool to uninstall Avast to see. But wait for the pros before doing anything. - How long have you had 2 antivirus programs, without issues?

 

I have been using the free comodo firewall and free avast anti-virus for over 3 months on 5 different PC's without any issues. I know not to put two anti-virus real-time scanners on the same computer at the same time. Thank you for trying though

 

you could boot into BIOS and check your SATA Operation setting. try AHCI and SATA and then try booting with each to see if that is the problem.

 

Ok, well I would edit my posts but it appears I can't. Just in case someone some day finds this via google or something:

One of my sata controllers overheated. Meaning unplugging the drive and plugging it into a different sata port completely fixed the problem. My hard drive is completely fine, and actually in slightly better shape than the external one, which is also ok.