trouble installing vista stopped xp from booting

[beergut67]

I took my hard drive with xp out of my computer, and put a second clean hard drive in to install vista. The install went bad now i cannot get xp to boot back up with my original hard drive back in. The computer will post up, and take a very long time detecting idd drives, then is starts saying "configuring mba press alt+ctrl+b to configure". Of coarse pressing these buttons does nothing. Let me know what you think i should do.

[rjfvillarosa]

Have you tried reseting the BIOS via the motherboard jumper?
Vista probably changed the BIOS settings in some way during the install procedure.

[beergut67]

yes i did try that.

[glc]

Have you verified your cabling and drive jumpering?

[beergut67]

Yes i have check the cables and the pin placement. I have reformatted the second drive and reinstalled windows xp in it and it still does the same thing. When i turn it on, it takes a very long time to detect idd drives, then it goes to a black screen which just says: " configuring mba press alt+ctrl+b to configure", (BTW it will not do anything different if i press those buttons) then it starts loading drivers for a 3-com lan which i do not have, then it states that there was a problem with the boot drive to replace the boot disk and hit enter. The only way i can get it to come up is if i have my windows xp disk in the drive when i boot it up. Then it will boot the windows program from the disk and start up my hard drive copy of windows, but it takes about 4 minutes for my computer to come up. please help.

[rjfvillarosa]

Originally Posted by beergut67 I have reformatted the second drive and reinstalled windows xp in it and it still does the same thing.

Did you zero fill the drive or fast format?
How did you mange to install XP? does the machine boot to a BIOS screen?

[beergut67]

I formatted using the xp disk before the xp install, and yes i do get through the post screen, i test mem, processor checks out and everything, just starts moving very slow after that.

[glc]

Download the diagnostics from the hard drive manufacturer and run them - sounds like your hard drive just died.

[beergut67]

ok i have tried that with no luck, but it seems pretty strange that both hard drives would go bad at the same time. When i ran the vista install on the second hard drive the first one was not even hooked up to the machine, and now it does it with either hard drive installed in any combination. Since my last post i had reflashed the bios as well with no luck.

[glc]

Both hard drives fail diagnostics, connecting them one at a time, properly cabled and jumpered?

System specs, including power supply brand and wattage, please.

[beergut67]

one more thing, i have reinstalled the mainboard drivers as well but it still does the same thing, i even went so far as to replace the memory sticks to see if that was the problem. Just to recap: I have two hard drives in my machine, one with the primary operating system and one empty for storage. I formatted the storage hard drive and shut my computer down, i then completely unhooked my primary hard drive and attempted to install the vista program, this went bad by doing exaxclt what is doing now. So when i hooked up the primary and unhooked the second hard drive the problem continues. My thinking is that it must be something the vista program tried to write to the flash mem? But that should have been taken care of by reflashing the bios. I have never seem something software related cause hardware to mess up that coulod not be fixed with a format and reinstall. Now the only way i can get my computer to boot up is if i have the windows xp disk in the cd drive when it starts up, but it still takes about 4-5 min where it used to take 30-45 sec.

[beergut67]

i am sorry i had ment to say that i would try that just did not think it was likley that both drives would fail the same way at the same time, i am working on finding the diagnostic tools for the western digital hard drives now, i will test them and let you know if they say there bad.
specs: (nothing is over clocked)
2.4 ghz p4 533 fsb
albatron px845pev pro
512 mb ddr 333 ram
2 x 40 gb WD hard drives
ati radeon 9600
thermaltake heatsink & fan
q-max model lc-b350atx PWS

[beergut67]

all drives checked out fine on quick test as well as extended test.

[glc]

BAD power supply. That's made by L&C. I'd replace it with a quality unit before you damage components with it, hopefully you aren't too late.

What you want is WD's Data Lifeguard Diagnostics for DOS, it downloads as a floppy disk maker, just make it and boot with it.

[beergut67]

Put another power supply in the case and still the same thing, any other ideas?

[MaxRat]

I would do a full clear of the cmos and then carefully go thru the bios and check/reset all settings....


try loading "optimized defaults" and see what happens..?

[beergut67]

i have cleared cmos, and reloaded default settings as well, none have helped. any other ideas?

[beergut67]

i also have reflashed the bios and ran diagnostics in both ms-dos as well as inside windows on my hard drive, both with quick test and full tests, no problems there.