Using Old Boot drive as external HD ??

[meetn2veg]

This will be very easy for someone else, but I'm finding it confusing.

My current situation requires that I need to use a loaned PC with all its existing s/w etc, but need to access all my data which is contained on 3 hard drives taken out of my previous HP.

Drives D:\ and E:\ work fine using an external HD case. However, I'm having probs with the old C:\ drive. In an external HD case, the jumpers need to be set so the HD is a MASTER rather than a SLAVE. On power-up, it sounds like it's trying to boot up! But it obviously can't as it's an external HD.

Any ideas as to how I can prevent old C:\ from booting so I can get at my data???

Many thanks in advance.....
R.

 

[edfair]

This may be a function of the BIOS in the machine looking for boot capabilities on a PATA drive first, wherever it can find one.
You might look in CMOS setup and see what the boot possibilities are.

Ed Fair
Give the wrong symptoms, get the wrong solutions.

 

[meetn2veg]

Thanks for your quick reply. However, as mentioned, the old C:\ drive is connected to the loaned PC via a USB port as an external hard drive. Therefore the CMOS boot order has nothing to do with the situation.

All I can still imagine is that it's the C:\ drive that needs to have something done to it. I have tried changing the dip switches, but even there, there are only 2 possibilities; slave or master. Neither of which work - although the disk powers up, it makes sounds as if it's searching. The loaned PC doesn't even get as far as recignising that it has an external hard drive plugged into it.

There's obviously a communication problem here, but I just don't understand much on the hardware side of things.

If anyone else has nothing better to do on Christmas day than to look through forums, then I'd still very much appreciate anyone's thoughts or ideas on this matter.

 

[edfair]

First read didn't click as USB.

In "theory" you should be able to boot to the existing stuff then plug the USB in. That was a selling point of USB but there is no guarantee that the external box people followed convention.

Is it possible that your old C: had something controlling the file system that the external box is choking on? A drive overlay for example?

Ed Fair
Give the wrong symptoms, get the wrong solutions.

 

[Freestone]

the old C:\ drive is connected to the loaned PC via a USB port as an external hard drive. Therefore the CMOS boot order has nothing to do with the situation

On the contrary, CMOS boot order may be the exact problem. Newer BIOS' allow for booting from a USB device. Check the boot order as suggested by edfair.

If this doesn't solve it, how is the USB enclosure being powered, from the USB bus alone or with an additional external power supply? Some drives require an external power supply connected, otherwise they will give off clicking noises when powering up and never become available for use; read this as the drive is starved for power.

 

[meetn2veg]

edfair - "In 'theory' you should be able to boot to the existing stuff then plug the USB in."

That is exactly what I'm doing in practice. Existing PC boots up fine (as it should!) Plugging in external hard drive 'should' (and does if I put D: + E: drives in) simply be PnP!

Freestone - 'On the contrary, CMOS boot order may be the exact problem. Newer BIOS' allow for booting from a USB device. Check the boot order as suggested by edfair.'

No need to check - although I have! This PC's BIOS doesn't allow for USB boot device. Just as well that it doesn't matter as I'm not booting the PC from an external source. I don't want to use my old C:\ to boot this PC - all I want is to be able to access the data it contains (numerous MySQL dbases, Perl and JScript library files, web page design etc... to be precise). And the box has its own power supply - it's a 'Conceptronic' standard USB2 external HD box.

Nevertheless, thank you all for your advice and suggestions. Hopefully together, we'll be able to sort this one out soon as I can't continue to work without this data (I could but it'd take months to re-write and key data etc...!!!)

Your continued input is more than welcome.

Cheers,
R.

 

[Freestone]

Any chance of removing the old C: drive from the USB enclosure and placing it into the loaner PC as a slave device, or is this not an option?

 

[meetn2veg]

Freestone - I have thought of that. There is a spare slot for it and have already plugged in my old D:\ end E:\ drives, but I'm not sure if that will make any difference with C:\.

I have tried both master and slave settings for C:\ in the external HD box and there was no change in what it did; ie: the PC didn't recognise it and it still made the 'searching' noises as it did when set to master/single drive, as it should be set to if using an external box.

I have also considered the option of removing the existing C:\ boot drive and replacing it with the old C:\ drive, but was warned against that in the summer as different motherboards may cause permanent damage to the disk and/or data, so I'd rather not even consider that option.

My h/w knowledge is limited, and anything beyond ribbon cables and dip switches and I'm completely lost!

Thanks again - I guess I'll just have to keep trying and waiting for other suggestions.

Cheers,
R.

 

[Freestone]

No, don't try replacing the existing C: drive with the old C: drive. Most likely it won't boot, and you may lose access to your data, as warned. Permament damage to the disk is unlikely, however.

It's unclear to me whether the USB enclosure you are using with the old C: drive has worked with any other drive(s)?

I don't see where it'll hurt to try taking the drive out of the USB enclosure and placing it into the system. At this point you need to narrow the problem to the drive, the USB enclosure, or the combination of the two. If I understand correctly, you've already tried the internal IDE interface in the loaned system with your D: and E: drives, so you've the expertise to try the C: drive.

 

[meetn2veg]

It has worked with both D:\ + E:\ and I've currently got my 40GB HD (Big Bertha) in it and she's working just perfectly.

Tomorrow I'll put C:\ in the PC as a slave and see what happens, although I doubt if this will change anything but I might be pleasantly surprised.

There is also the possibility that C:\ is dead! Or at least senile.

Again thanks for your help.

R.

 

[Freestone]

Well I've been trying to avoid mentioning that constant seeking sounds from a hard drive at power-on usually means a hard drive gone bad, but as I mentioned, it could also mean lack of power. Placing it into the system unit should answer our questions.

Good luck and keep your progress posted.

 

[edfair]

Rather than have a potentially corrupted old C: affect booting I would put it on the secondary channel in place of the CD and leave it as master.

I would be curious whether there is a choice in the CMOS setup to autodetect the drives. This is an addional key from setting it to auto in drive type. If you had the choice available it would scan the IDE controllers and show you what the drive types are and the ramifications of the different settings you could make.

Also would be curious what a bootable floppy with fdisk would show for partitioning on the drive.

Ed Fair
Give the wrong symptoms, get the wrong solutions.

 

[wolluf]

just reiterate one of Ed's questions - did the drive have overlay software installed? (or Norton Goback)? Both would cause problems when trying to access in another system.

 

[meetn2veg]

wolluf - thanks but the old C:\ had the usual installed on it such as Win NT, CorelDraw, MySQL, phpMyAdmin, etc... No anti-virus, no Norton/Symantec stuff, nothing out of the ordinary.

To update everyone, I have since tried plugging it in to the PC in the 2ndary IDE cable as a slave and still got the same seeking/ticking noises as before. I have not tried the other option suggested of disconnecting the CD drive and having the HD set up as master on the 2nd IDE chanel. But I suspect that it wont make any difference!!!

Anyone know how I can recover data from a knackered Seagate???

 

[wolluf]

If you can't get a machine to recognise it, then only way is expensive data recovery company.

If you can get a machine to recognise it, then something like getdataback might be able to recover the data.

 

[edfair]

Time for the manufacturer's diagnostics with this as the only drive in the system.

Ed Fair
Give the wrong symptoms, get the wrong solutions.

 

[wahnula]

My first step would be to swap a known-to-be-working external enclosure box with target HDD.

Tony

 

[Freestone]

Tony:

It's unclear to me whether the USB enclosure you are using with the old C: drive has worked with any other drive(s)?

It has worked with both D:\ + E:\ and I've currently got my 40GB HD (Big Bertha) in it and she's working just perfectly.

 

[tomaso11]

Although I think this is a little over my head how are the drives identified. If the new machine has a drive C what letter would be assigned to your old drive?

Thomas

 

[ASG0856]

I agree with tomaso, when you plug in the old C:\ drive, it's probably being seen as another c:\ drive (being a boot disk, the drive letter is probably assigned in the MBR), which of course won't work. With the drive plugged in, have you gone into disk management to see if it's recognised, but not assigned a drive letter. You could then assign a new letter and all would be hunky dory.