Computer Room B***** Computer??

[ampedef]

Had an horendous morning and only just finished. Desktop would not boot into windows 7pro. Tried all ways and after loading my repair disk and disconnting 2 spare drives, 1 with Linux and the other used as backup, found the 'backup' drive causing the problem. WHY? I ask myself. Any ideas anyone?

 

[Banny]

So if your 'backup' drive is not plugged in all is well, if plugged in won't boot?

Recently my mates is loosing the boot priority and choosing its own drive as 1st boot device.

Check boot priority in BIOS, check if hdd is even being picked up.

and a backup should be kept in an alternative location to the original otherwise a backup is merely a copy

 

[ampedef]

Correct on point 1 Banny. Both 1Gb SataII drives were showing as OK. Now after C: drive has loaded windows, (win7 pro 64), and hot plugging second drive, and then restart, nothing. On Bios screen, at Boot, F8 for bootable HD, still nothing. I can only asume that there is, as you say "a copy'. In the process of getting a USB Caddy to try and check/clean second HD. I have some software somewhere to repair Hard Disks. Thanks for getting back.

 

[DirtyDonki]

 

[Banny]

If you can't detect it in BIOS, then HDD is more than likely dead.
If it won't boot with caddy plugged in or detect it, if plugged in after boot then this confirms that the HDD is dead, probable cause wear and tear or power going off at wrong time (wrong time as far as HDD is concerned).



If you start to have other problems with pc, then this could suggest the HDD was damaged by a power surge or other faulty component - I doubt this will be the case to be honest but it is in the realms of possible.

=====
Merely for info if anyone is interested -

Samsung boast HDD Sizes of 16TB plus, loosing the contents of that would be like loosing your life, well for me it would.

Keeping archived copies, and using RAID configurations are what companies do to protect theirself.

For more info on using RAIDS see -

http://www.thegeekstuff.com/2010/08/raid-levels-tutorial/

Clearly an overkill for most normal users.

 

[ampedef]

I tend to agree with a Dead drive or corrupted. I will let you know how the caddy performs, and if no go will splash out on another drive, possibly an SSD. Don't really need a backup drive now with a DS215j. I use that for backup and streaming. Not into raid really. This all happened out of the 'Blue'. Got to remember, "If it aint broke dont fix it". Thanks for the feedback.

 

[ampedef]

Removed spare HD from pc and bought myself an Inateck Docking Station. Used Acronis Disk Director 11, and managed to save the 'Wonky HD'. I will now use it as a seperate backup disk, although with I dont really need another, (Synology DS215j takes care of backups). Might use it for streaming instead. Anyway I still don't know what went wrong.