I installed a 2nd hard drive in cable position 2. Both hard drive jumpers are set to "cable select".

If I go into Windows, Disk Management recognizes the 2nd hard drive with all correct information. I can also open the drive and view all the files.

But if I go into Setup (BIOS), the drive is unrecognized. It just says "unknown". I tried everything to change it in Setup but it is still not recognized. (The main HDD says "Auto" in Bios and has complete drive information.)

I want to be able to change the boot order to occasionally boot off the 2nd HDD, without swapping cables around.

Any idea why the BIOS is not recognizing the 2nd HDD?

Thanks...

Please Help...

Can you change the jumpers to master/slave?

If so is the drive recognized now?

What happens if you take drive A out and try to boot from the second drive? (playing with jumper settings ie: take drive A out, put jumper on Drive B to master or cable select)


I forgot but you said this second drive is bootable correct?

The 2nd drive is bootable if I put in in 1st cable position (end of cable).

I read online that sometimes the manufacturer of the drive can cause this. Makes no sense to me, but a lot of people seemed to agree. My main drive is a WD, and my secondary drive is a Maxtor.

BTW, if I just plug the Maxtor into cable position 1 (end of cable) it boots up fine and is recognized normally by the bios.

PS: These are IDE drives.

Thanks...

So what's the issue?

Can you put Maxtor as Master and WD as slave? Or cable select and Maxtor in 1st and WD in second?

I think you're trying to connect both and boot from one or the other? Am I correct?

I am trying to put a 2nd bootable HDD with OS in position 2, so I can clone it back to HDD in position 1, which gets corrupted every few months. (don't know why... it's new and it has happened on the old drive as well)

Now I do it manually, which requires opening the case and switching cables. Doable, but a nuisance.

Are you saying that you cannot have 2 bootable HDDs in the PC at the same time?

If I had the 2nd bootable HDD installed, and my main HDD crashed, could I just turn off main HDD in Bios, and then have the Bios recognize 2nd HDD and boot from that without switching cables?

I am not saying you can't have two bootbale disks because quite frankly I don't know (I always dual boot). I will do some research or perhaps someone else would know the answer to that question.

In theory you should just be abke to go into BIOS and select it to boot from HD2 rather then 1 but in your case when HD2 is in the second slot it is unrecognized is that correct?

Yes. It is only unrecognizable in Bios. Says "unknown"

All info in disk management is there and correct.

Weird...

Have you considered that maybe it's not your HD getting corrupted but your OS? Is it a legit copy?

I realize HD's can't get corrupted as they are physical but I would be worrying more about why your HD1 keeps going bad?

Can I ask why you need two bootable drives (I know one keeps going bad but that is the OS not the drive). Is it the same OS install on drive2? If so I would let HD2 go for a month or so and see if that goes bad!

In the interest of time and space here, I didn't get into the details.

You are correct. The drive is not going bad, just the OS system gets corrupted for some reason, every 3 months or so. I thought at first it was a bad drive, so I installed a new one. But every few months, the OS gets corrupted and I can't boot to Windows.

BTW, I have a legal copy of Windows.

I have a clone backup copy of the entire drive including OS. So I just pop that in, format the corrupted HDD, fire up Casper XP, and clone the original drive. In 12 minutes, everything is back to normal.

As to why this is happening, I have ruled out the drive, so I believe that leaves the PS and mobo. Since this PC is really old, and it has a Dell proprietary PS, neither component is worth the cost of replacement.

This is the reason I want to install a 2nd bootable drive. So when the main drive's OS gets corrupted, I can boot to drive 2, and clone it back to drive 1, without opening the case and switching cables.

It seems like I am close here, but just can't get the bios to recognize drive 2.

As I mentioned earlier, I read on another forum that sometimes if the mfgr is different on the 2 HDDs, the second is not recognized by the Bios. Not sure if that is true?

So, bottom line, how can I get the bios to recognize HDD 2 so I can boot to it when HDD 1 crashes?

Thanks for hanging in there with me IT...

You have both HD's connected via cable select. Correct?
When HD1 goes down you want to boot from HD2. Correct?
BIOS shows HD2 as unknown. Thus can't boot from it. Correct?
So you have to go manually and set HD2 to channel 1 on the cable. Correct?

What happens if you set jumpers to Master & Slave? Is the drive recognized then?

I don't know why mfgr has anything to do with it. If the HD can connect via correct cables then I don't see why it matters the mfgr. (although, things that seem logical never are in the IT world :))

Correct
Correct
Correct
Correct
Have not tried changing jumpers from cable select, to master / slave.

If the Bios recognizes the drive as a slave, and the master drive crashes, will the system allow me to boot from a slave drive?

As far as mixing different brands of HDDs, see posts 4 and 7 on this forum: BIOS Won't Recognize 2nd IDE Hard Drive! - CNET Windows XP Forums

As long as your slave is bootable I don't see an issue.

Thank you. I'll give it a try...

Let me know the outcome!

I probably won't have time to try it until this evening. Will definitely let you know. I hope this works...

Thanks for all your help.

Not a problem. I am just curious as I have never done this before. I have had multiple drives but I have never had a bootbale second HD. I just always dual booted and used the remaining drives for data!

IT:

I have thought about your suggestions and plan to try 2 approaches to try and get the bios to recognize drive 2, and hopefully boot off it.

1) Change the jumpers from cable select to master / slave.

2) Install the same make and model of HDD in disk 2 position on IDE cable, and set jumpers to cable select (as was mentioned in the article). Makes no sense to me, but worth a try.

Couldn't get to it this evening. Will post my results as soon as possible.

Thanks again.

PS: A friend is giving me a PC that accidentally had the HDD formatted, along with Windows XP. No Windows or Driver CD available. I have heard of recovery utilities for deleted files. Have you heard of any way to recover an entire drive including OS and drivers?

1. Let me know about the two different ways you're going to try.

2. No. I haven't. Post a new thread and I am sure someone has.

P.S. I'm still curious as to know why your OS gets corrupted every three months. This sounds like a pirated OS issue. But you said it's legit. Hmm.. weird!

It is definitely legit. I have the COA and product key. I have validated it with MS. I even have the XP packaging (it originally came with Window ME). Also, the PC is about 10 years old, and this just started happening in the last 9 months.

My "guess" is a power supply glitch or surge. But as I mentioned earlier, it's so old that it's not worth investing any more money into repairs.

My concern is, if it is a PS surge that is corrupting the OS on drive 1, and I add a clone backup drive in bay 2, the PS surge could corrupt both drives, in which case this was all for nothing, (other than leaning how to boot off a 2nd HDD).

Well there's a chance it would only corrupt the HD currently being utilized so then you could switch to the second HD when HD 1 goes down.

Its still a good learning experience!

I agree. That is why I really want to try and get this going. Even if it crashed both drives, at least I'll know how to play nice with the bios going forward.

Update:

Tried swapping drives around, tried different brand drives, tried changing from Cable Select, to Master / Slave.

Nothing made the PC recognize 2nd hard drive.

I'm out of ideas.

Maybe the bios version is too old.

I apologize for my absence. ( I had military stuff)

I am unsure if you have did this or not since this issue was spread over a couple threads a lost track of everything you've tried :(

If HDD2 is in master or 1st slot in cable select is it recognized? What if if it's the only HDD hooked up?

Good questions.

If HDD 2 (Backup clone drive set to cable select) is installed in primary cable location (end of cable) it boots fine and the PC works normally, even if another drive is in secondary cable location.

In fact, that is how I fix things when the hard drive gets corrupted. I install my backup clone in primary cable location, and my corrupted drive is secondary cable location. Boot up the PC, format the corrupted drive in bay 2, then clone primary drive to secondary drive. Then I remove the backup drive, put the original drive back in primary location, and all is well for a few months.

Even though the Bios doesn't recognize HDD 2, Windows does, so I am able to clone from it as above.

I never tried to boot the PC from secondary cable location, if there was no drive in primary cable location.

But if the PC won't boot from secondary location with 2 drives installed, then it really doesn't matter. That is what I need it to do.

Why not just use HDD2 as your main since this seems to work! Unless it's a size issue.

It doesn't matter what HDD I use. Something in the PC keeps corrupting the OS. Then I have to clone the HDD to get it running again.

FYI:

I think w_smith_29 above is sending out some type of spam. I got exactly the same message from him on another thread.

OK. We need to determine what we're trying to fix here. The OS becoming corrupt or the HDD issues.

If it is a true legit copy of Windows then I would say you got a rare (ive never seen one) copy of windows that has some corrupt system files. Or a certain program/software you have is corrupt and trickling to the OS causing it to crash!

I actually addressed your questions very early on in the thread. Allow me to summarize:

The PC is a very old Dell (10 years) with an expensive propitiatory power supply.

My copy of XP is legit.

The OS corruption is not being caused by the HDD itself, as it happens on any HDD I install.

This just started about 9 months ago, after years of no problems. Even if I do a fresh reinstall of Windows it still happens.

I have discussed this on this forum and with IT friends, and the consensus is that is is most likely a power supply problem (glitch or surge).

I don't have the money for a new PC right now, and I'm not going to spend any more on this ancient PC. My wife just uses it for emails and a bit of web surfing.

It is easy to get it up and running after a crash. All I have to do is format and clone the HDD.

The ONLY reason I was trying to install and boot off a 2nd HDD was so I didn't have to get down on the floor, and open the PC case after a crash to install and clone the HDD. I just wanted to boot from HDD #2 and then clone it back to HDD #1.

As you know, I was not able to get the Bios to recognize HDD #2 for some reason.

So at this point, I don't think there is much left for me to do, unless someone can tell my why the bios won't recognize HDD #2, but windows does recognize it in device manager.

So that's the whole story.

Thanks to all for your suggestions, especially IT who has given me a great deal of feedback on this matter.

If anyone has an idea how to get the bios to recognize HDD #2 so I can boot from it, that would be fantastic!