BOOT DISK FAILURE, INSERT SYSTEM DISK AND PRESS ENTER

[andynyc]

Hello,

Sorry for the all caps subject line, just wanted to quote the error
exactly as I am seeing it.

My relatively new PC (first start up was June 1, 2006) has now been out
of commission for 2 weeks. It all began two Saturday's ago when there
was what I believe to be an improper shutdown of Windows at the tail
end of a Windows Update that was underway.

No blue screen of death, just what appeared to be a normal restart
after the Windows Update (which appeared to be interrupted--perhaps--by
a non-responding program).

I have not been back to Windows (XP Home Edition Service Pack 2) since
that restart. I can now only get to "BOOT DISK FAILURE, INSERT SYSTEM
DISK AND PRESS ENTER."

I consider myself to be medium savvy with computers, but definitely not
an expert. However, my brother is very savvy and we have not been able
to get the system running again after numerous over-the-phone tries.
His opinion is that the BIOS is somehow messed up. We have tried
everything... Well, maybe not "everything," but if you were to do a
"BOOT DISK FAILURE" search on Google, I guarantee you we have been to
every link on the first 5 search pages, possibly more, and tried it
all.

Here are my system specs:

Windows XP Home Edition Service Pack 2
Gigabyte Mother Board with 2 Gigs RAM
Two CD/DVD Drives
Two Hard Drives (one with about 150 GB with OS, and the second with 300
GB for media storage and backup)
nVidia 7900GT 256MB Graphics Card
500 Watt Power Supply
.... and a lot of other stuff, all of which has been working 100%
perfectly prior to the episode I described above.

Anyway, I have tried "everything" I can think of to recover the system
and NOT lose all of my data on the OS hard drive (which I will call
C, if it can be helped. Here is a rundown:

- used Windows Recovery Console to try things like fixmbr, fixboot,
etc.
- copied ntldr, ntdetect.com and boot.ini from working Windows XP Home
Edition Service Pack 2 PC over the files on my OS Drive, successfully,
but it made no difference
- tried in-place install of XP on the drive from recovery disk, which
was successful and preserved drive data (ALL of which is visible from
the Recovery Console prompt, when pressing R immediately after it loads
and not pressing Enter to get to the next screen where you can do a
repair or install fresh), but didn't help
- tried booting from boot floppy disk
- tried booting from boot CD-ROM

I have NEVER gotten beyond the BOOT DISK FAILURE, INSERT SYSTEM DISK
AND PRESS ENTER error message since the "crash" occurred, despite
trying all of the above and more.

Most recently, I disabled the original OS drive in BIOS, and did a
fresh install of XP on the SECONDARY drive (which I will call D.
Obviously, when I disabled the original OS Drive (C, the secondary
Drive (D became C:. In any event, I booted into D: via my recovery CD
and verified that, indeed, I was looking at the secondary drive and not
my original OS drive, the goal being that I want to try and preserve
the data on C: (which I can see, it's all there!) if I ever get back to
running this machine.

After the clean XP install on the secondary drive (using the recovery
disk that came with the PC, which is NOT an XP disk like you'd get from
a store if you purchased XP, but rather the image of everything on your
PC when it was set up at the factory, as I am sure most of you are
familiar with), still got BOOT DISK FAILURE message.

I think this is because the PC is still trying to boot from the
original (C drive and not the secondary (D drive, which became C:
when I disabled the original OS drive in BIOS.

Mind you, BIOS sees both of these drives. The drives are connected fine
and powered fine. I can see data on both of them. But something is
wrong... After two weeks of trying, including the clean install on the
second drive, I really think this is a BIOS issue...?

Another thing I did, because I suspected that the system is for some
reason still trying to look for the original OS on C: rather than the
clean install I did on the secondary drive, was to open the case and
switch the connector cables for the two drives around on the
motherboard, in an attempt to fool the system. I figured this might
cause the clean OS install on D: (now C: because original C: OS Drive
is disabled in BIOS) to be the one that the system booted. GUESS NOT!
Still got BOOT DISK FAILURE message on restart. I tried variously
enabling and disabling the two drives in BIOS "Integrated Peripherals"
options, but still nothing.

I am convinced there is not a problem with the drives because I can see
the data on both when looking around via the recovery CD command
prompt. Unfortunately, the recovery console limits my commands and I
cannot copy data files from the original OS drive to the secondary
drive, which is why I attempted to do a clean install on the secondary
drive to begin with. No funny noises or other weirdness with the
drives.

Drives are SATAII, just FYI.

One thing... the first day this issue began, I went into BIOS and chose
the "Load Fail Safe Defaults." Did I somehow mess up my BIOS settings
in doing that? Maybe that was a big no-no... If so, what can be done to
fix it?

Sorry for the long-winded message, but I wanted to get as much
information out there to you (the public, who I am hoping can help me)
as possible.

Just to be clear, here is the current state of things:

- have never been back into XP since this issue occurred
- can access BIOS
- have restore/recovery CD I can boot from (but not into XP, just
recovery options from CD and recovery command prompt when pressing R
once it loads)
- can boot to DOS from floppy boot disk
- secondary drive now has clean OS install on it and is enabled in BIOS
- original OS drive has all of the data I want to "save" if possible.
It was disabled after I did the clean install to the secondary HD, but
has been variously enabled and disabled afterward as I tried to get
past BOOT DISK FAILURE message.
- Drive cables attached to motherboard were swapped around (I can swap
back if needed)

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance..

AndyNYC

 

[Steve Fernandes]

My very viable guess:

Dead Harddrive.

How to test:

Swap Harddrive out with that of another one, prefably one with XP.

YOU SHOULD NOT BE ABLE TO BOOT INTO XP, as the hardware abstaction layer
will not be recognized for your PC. But you should be able to see the splash
screen. If you see the splash screen.. and then get a blue screen error with
the new harddrive, that answers your problem.

But ya most likely dead harddrive.

You can also try and put that harddrive as a slave into another computer and
see if you can access / copy files to the new computer. If you hear the
harddrive struggling to read or chugging, then most likely again, dead
harddrive.

Have fun.

 

[AndyNYC]

My very viable guess:

Dead Harddrive.

Thanks!!

Well, actually, the drive is fine. I think I can be officially
classified as a fool. So, when I chose the "Load Fail Safe Defaults" in
my BIOS settings, which I did rather rashly after the problem first
began, it must have changed the BIOS settings to something other than
what they were meant to be...because my PC should not be using RAID
but, in the BIOS, was set to use that.

So, I went into Integrated Peripherals, chose the first setting
(RAID/SATII config or something like that) and disabled the very first
option. This caused all subsequent options (8 in all; 4 for IDE, 4 for
SATAII) to all become disabled as well. Saved the BIOS settings and
exited. Computer restarted... and what do you know? It boots back into
XP.

That said, I now have a second issue... I did a clean install of XP on
the drive (because I'd messed around with trying to fix it quite a bit
the past few weeks and want a fresh start), and now my internet is
unavailable. I have a connection that works fine on another PC, which
is hooked up to a modem and router (DSL). Anyway, when I first got this
PC, all I did was plug in the cable and the internet worked straight
away. Suddenly, that doesn't seem to be the case.

I installed the drivers that came on the D-Link disk.... but nothing so
far... Any ideas? Is this a common issue after a clean XP install?

AndyNYC