Cloned Hard Drive will not boot except with Emergency Flopppy 3

[DIS009]

I needed to upgrade my Windows XP Pro SP2, HP NC6000 laptop from 30 GB to a more realistic size, and decided to get a Seagate Momentus 80 GB hard drive on basis of cost and apparent compatibility.

Transfer/Install sequence was:
1 Initialised disk using Disk Management on Windows XP Pro via USB link/caddy.
2 Formatted as one basic partition, again using Disk Management on Windows XP Pro via USB link/caddy.
3 Cloned from 30 GB IDE (C) drive to new disk using Symantec Ghost 8.2.
4 Installed new disk in laptop.
5 Would not boot - hangs with a flashing underline.
6 Used Windows XP, SP2 Recovery Console (RC) and fixboot command.
7 Would not boot - hangs with a flashing underline.
8 Used Windows XP, SP2 Recovery Console (RC) and fixmbr command.
9 Would not boot - hangs with a flashing underline.
10 Used Windows XP, SP2 CD to install/repair installation.
11 When asked to remove CD, would not boot - hangs with a flashing underline.
12 Booted into RC and tried CHKDSK /R - still hangs.

13 The disk is visible and usable (via RC and XP install/repair), so it does work ok, but why won't it boot?
14 The system will boot into Windows via an emergency floppy boot disk containing NTLDR, NTDETECT.COM & BOOT.INI.
15 If the boot order is changed to HD first, CD second the machine hangs with a flashing underline.

Using Information in

http://dotnetjunkies.com/weblog/unknownreference/articles/12284.aspx,

the machine seems to be sticking between the "Fixed Disk" and "Operating System" steps but I cannot see why. Is the BIOS unable to cope with this disk?

Going into BIOS Setup gives NO options for disk setup, but disk tests run ok.

 

[rclarke250]

If you use a botable floppy with fdisk on it, does it show the disk partition as active? If the bios will see the drive and give indicators like drive model, it will ussually be able to boot from and use the disk...

 

[wolluf]

Did disk management see the whole 80 (or 70+) GB?
Did Ghost?
Could try removing partition then ghosting to blank disk?
Could try installing XP clean on new disk - just to see if it will boot like that (in case its a problem with the disk).

Does sound odd! (I've had a number of non-booting Ghosted drives - but fixboot has always sorted it for me).

 

[DIS009]

Have not used fdisk as it's an NTFS drive, but the Symantec Gdisk which comes with Ghost (& they say is better!) shows the partition as active and all the Head, Cylinder, Model data. Booting into Windows via floppy and using Disk Management shows it as an Active System partition.

Also Disk Management shows the whole partition, as did Ghost. I've used the -FDSP (leave disk signature) switch in Ghost but not the -FDSZ (Redo) one yet.

Sounds like try (1) Blank Disk (2) FDSZ (3) Clean XP next!

The interesting fact is that it stops with no BIOS or XP error message and will not go on to try the CD/FDD boot device. This would seem to point to the MBR or Partition Data being faulty. Wondered about installing another Boot Loader (come across GRUB) but this is not an area I know about.

 

[rvnguy]

DIS009,

These are problems that I have encountered with "Ghost" and as a result I do not use it. See the following link for "DiscWizard" from Segate if you did not get it with your drive.

http://www.seagate.com/support/disc/drivers/discwiz.html

I am coping the text from another link and will provide the post if you wish to look at it also.

Method: I use the mfg's install software to create an image of the main drive (this includes all sys files also) to a drive specifically for this purpose(backup). This requires opening the case and plugging up the drive. I let the software quick format the backup drive and select "install this drive as a new boot drive". I receive an identical image of the current boot drive and just refrain from actually swapping this drive as the boot drive. I do this once a week and during the week copy new files to a data drive on a daily basis. It is a bit cumbersome, but assures that your important data is about as safe as can be. Plus it is "free".

In your case once the cloned image is generated you would replace the "C" drive with the just cloned drive.

As an after thought: I have not worked with laptop drives much, but they are IDE compliant. Are there and are you setting the drive initially as slave? Then re-setting as master when installing as the primary drive? Not sure if you have to or can but if it is like other IDE drives you must.

Acronis was also recommended but is a for purchase item but looks to be worth it for continued use and backup.

thread779-1079816

rvnguy

 

[DIS009]

Right, where are we? No further forward. Symantec support suggest I use MS Sysprep, but some of the messages about resetting SIDs etc worry me. Will I be able to access everything as me afterwards? Also, why would it change anything at the BIOS/MBR/Boot interface?

Tried using Seagate Disk Wizard, and although it seemed a bit slower appeared do a similar job to Ghost. However, it still had the same problem. Perfect boot using the emergency floppy and new hard disk files, but just a flashing cursor on the new hard disk on its own.
It MUST be the HP BIOS. Trouble is the new disk is Seagate, not HP, so I guess HP will not be able to help.

 

[chaps]

Some years back a bootable disk was used as a key for some systems to prevent anyone but the authorized person form accessing the hard drive or files on the system. I have fixed boot issues in past by copying the boot disk to the hard drive. This sometimes overwrites files that maybe holding back the boot process, or will allow access by doing an extra step. This may be a bad idea, but when all else fails, why not? You may be experiencing a bios issue that conflicts with the operating system- the drive must be properly recognized. This is why some new drives require a boot bios installed. Or you need a bios upgrade (bios flash) in order to use the new larger size drive.

 

[DIS009]

Tried clean install of XP to a partition the same size as the old drive and system booted fine! Then Seagate Disk Wizard Maintenance Copy Files. There were a few files it could not open to write to, but the new disk booted fine. Then issues with crashing Recovery Point application and corrupt Recycle Bin, but its a step forward. The normal apps seemed to run ok.

 

[DIS009]

More movement forwards, but still not to closure!

Still avoiding sysprep as frightened that the original disk won't come back up ok with the network users, data, etc if I have to revert (yet) again.

Tonight I tried taking the original disk out of the laptop and putting that one in the USB caddy while putting the new one in the laptop and THEN doing a partition clone. Booted fine but a bit slow, but unable to log on to windows even as administrator. Started to log on then logged off immediately. Next step is to clone the disk. If that fails, then run sysprep, swap disks, clone disks, reboot. I'll log what happens as it might help someone else!

rynguy's comment about IDE was useful. It's obviously the USB caddy that's confused Ghost. Problem is, laptops only come with one IDE socket. Anyone know of a maintenance bodger cable to connect two IDE laptop drives to one socket?

 

[G0AOZ]

Well you can get 2.5" to 3.5" IDE convertors, to enable a laptop drive to connect to a conventional IDE motherboard interface. Perhaps you could use two of these to connect two laptop drives to Primary and Secondary interfaces on a motherboard and then copy between them etc. I'm not a user of Ghost, preferring to use Power Quest, but this configuration ought to work I'd have thought...

ROGER - G0AOZ.

 

[DIS009]

Success!
With NEW disk in laptop and OLD disk in USB caddy, did Ghost Disk Copy to partition of same size on new disk. (It might be ok for a resize, but have not tried that.) Booted fine, Did an automatic CHKDSK, Rebooted, Logged on as me (An Admin user), detected disk had changed rebooted, logged on again and has run very successfully since.

Obviously there is an issue in Ghost with cloning from a laptop ide connected drive to an ide drive in a USB caddy, but the other direction works as it says on the tin!

I suspect that Seagate Disk Wizard would do the same.

Thanks to all for the help and suggestions - and being patient while I floundered!

 

[Sevenpointone]

Refering to post of rvnguy of 24 Jun,05
" This requires opening the case and plugging up the drive."
Could someone enlighten me to what plugging refers to. I dislike Ghost also and have both Seagate and Maxtor drives.
The Seagate disc wiz seems pretty straight forward in its purpose. My Maxblast3 drive to drive copy does not seem to state that a new boot drive will be made,(although it will used as a back up).Any comments would be appreciated

 

[rvnguy]

Sevenpointone,
If you are still watching for an answer:
My Jun 24, 05 post: " This requires opening the case and plugging up the drive." was in reference to what I copied from another post of mine that dealt with backing up data. sooo I was refering to having to open a tower case and plugging in a HD to backup files to. Sorry that it was unclear.

MaxBlast3 refers to it as "disk to disk copy"

As you state that you have both types I would suggest that you use the software that matches the drive type you intend to copy to.

Hop this clears it up.

rvnguy

"I know everything..I just can't remember it all

 

[Sevenpointone]

rvnguy, thanks, as I was curious to its reference. Ya know a dog can still get new tricks. I wish I had grasped ahold of this trick long ago. Its so freakin easy. I got some rack mounts, In the front and out. Trying a partioned drive, I can only get the first partion to get recognized, understandable, but theres always a way. Come across a method to get the other partions seen by the software.

7.1

"Guess I haven't seen it all, woulda remembered this one!