Bad SATA drive

[Gwen Morse]

Gwen:
Just so we have a better understanding of your present situation and exactly
what you're trying to accomplish...

1. Your SATA HDD is from a desktop PC? There's no present connection between
it and your laptop, right? If I have this right - the SATA HDD is still
installed in the desktop machine or do you have it in some sort of SATA or
USB enclosure?

The SATA drive is cabled up to a desktop PC. However, the physical
case is open, so, I have easy access to it.

2. The SATA HDD was a formerly bootable HDD and somehow became corrupted so
that it will not boot. Is that right? How do you know that drive has a "bad
MBR"? Any reason to believe that you might be dealing with a defective HDD?
What's the make & model of the SATA HDD?

Seagate Barracuda 7200 250 GB SATA drive.

Why I think it has a bad MBR: It has Windows XP on it. It will not
boot into windows. Instead, it gives the error message: DISK BOOT
FAILURE, INSERT SYSTEM DISK AND PRESS ENTER

If I put in a different physical hard drive (older, IDE, also with
Windows XP on it), I can browse the SATA drive if it's also plugged
in. I can run programs off of it. Etc. The only thing I _can't_ do is
boot from it.

3. Is your present objective (at least at this point) just to access that
SATA HDD so that its contents - your user-created data - can be accessed? Is
that the reason you mention a possible connection to your laptop? Or is your
main objective (at this time) to return that SATA HDD to a bootable,
functional state?

My ultimate goal is to restore it to being a functional primary drive
on my PC. If I have to, I can clone it to another, blank 250 gig SATA
drive (Although that won't fix the issue with it not booting). But, I
want to end up with one 250 gig SATA drive (that boots into Windows)
in my PC. After that works, I want to go back to having two SATA
drives that mirror each other (the reason I have two 250 gig drives).

4. Could you clarify your idea about cloning the contents of the SATA HDD to
a PATA HDD? This can be done, of course, but what would the purpose be? Just
to "safeguard" the contents of the SATA HDD?

If it's necessary to get the OS and contents off the SATA drive, I can
clone it to large PATA drive. However, I still need the image to
eventually be bootable.

I think I might have some suggestions for you, but before posting them, I
really would like to get a clearer picture of just what machines &
configurations you're working with and your precise objectives.

If you want to go on in this vein, please provide as much detail as you can
re where that SATA HDD came from; what kind of problem did you experience
with it and how did it arise; specifics as to the PCs you're working with
and whatever other details you think are pertinent.

The problems started when I had a working SATA mirror array (two 250
gig drives) and didn't realize just how badly Linux handles SATA. I
took down the array and tried to install Linux on one of the drives.
The other one was bootable as a single drive for a short time (a few
days?) but then started coming up with the error message I show above.

Gwen

 

[Gwen Morse]

I have a Seagate Barracuda 7200 250 GB SATA drive. It appears to have
a bad MBR. Why I think it has a bad MBR: It has Windows XP on it. It
will not boot into windows. Instead, it gives the error message: DISK
BOOT FAILURE, INSERT SYSTEM DISK AND PRESS ENTER

If I put in a different physical hard drive (older, IDE, also with
Windows XP on it), I can browse the SATA drive if it's also plugged
in. I can run programs off of it. Etc. The only thing I _can't_ do is
boot from it.

My ultimate goal is to restore it to being a functional primary drive
on my PC. If I have to, I can clone it to another, blank 250 gig SATA
drive (Although that won't fix the issue with it not booting). But, I
want to end up with one 250 gig SATA drive (that boots into Windows)
in my PC. After that works, I want to go back to having two SATA
drives that mirror each other (the reason I have two 250 gig drives).

Any suggestions on getting the drive working?

Gwen

 

[peter]

here is the website for an explanation of the XP Recovery Console.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307654

you might want to try the following commands:
chkdsk
fix MBR
Fix boot

let us know
peter

 

[Jan Alter]

I have a Seagate Barracuda 7200 250 GB SATA drive. It appears to have
a bad MBR. Why I think it has a bad MBR: It has Windows XP on it. It
will not boot into windows. Instead, it gives the error message: DISK
BOOT FAILURE, INSERT SYSTEM DISK AND PRESS ENTER

If I put in a different physical hard drive (older, IDE, also with
Windows XP on it), I can browse the SATA drive if it's also plugged
in. I can run programs off of it. Etc. The only thing I _can't_ do is
boot from it.

My ultimate goal is to restore it to being a functional primary drive
on my PC. If I have to, I can clone it to another, blank 250 gig SATA
drive (Although that won't fix the issue with it not booting). But, I
want to end up with one 250 gig SATA drive (that boots into Windows)
in my PC. After that works, I want to go back to having two SATA
drives that mirror each other (the reason I have two 250 gig drives).

Any suggestions on getting the drive working?

Gwen

Hi,

I've run into this same difficulty a number of times. There are a
couple of things to consider before jumping off the diving board before you
attempt a fix. First, since you do have access to the SATA drive back up all
your data. If you have Acronis True Image then by all means make an image of
the drive onto the system drive that you currently have booting if you have
enough room, or onto an external USB drive. If you don't have Acronis you
can download it and use it free for 15 days. It is a magnificent backup
program.
That said before even thinking of doing a Repair Installation of XP
verify that there is not a physical problem with the SATA drive by
downloading Seagate's diagnostic utility and then run it. It is not even
worth reinstalling Windows if you have a physical defect in the hdd. If the
drive verifies as being OK then it's worth trying a repair installation of
XP.
You do that with the XP installation disk. Make sure you have set the
bios to start with the CD-ROM drive and then start the installation. If you
get the screen that asks if you want to repair with the recovery consule
don't choose it and continue with going to install Windows. Hopefully the
next screen will give you the option to do a Repair install of Windows. If
you don't get the screen then it is most probable that you will have to do a
clean install of the OS.
I should mention that I have attempted repair installations using
recovery consule probably three times. None of them worked, although the
last time was the very best adjustment as it allowed me to restart the
computer with the XP installation disk and the Repair Windows installation
screen did come up to allow Windows to recover 'almost' nicely. Strange
things were still happening and I finally did a clean install of the OS.
There are numerous articles that you can find on the web for step by step
procedures to do a repair install of windows and with recovery consule (if
you happen to be in the experimenter's mood. Heck, you might even get the
perfect repair using that method and it sure is exciting if you enjoy using
a DOS-like atmosphere).

 

[Larry]

I have a Seagate Barracuda 7200 250 GB SATA drive. It appears to have
a bad MBR. Why I think it has a bad MBR: It has Windows XP on it. It
will not boot into windows. Instead, it gives the error message: DISK
BOOT FAILURE, INSERT SYSTEM DISK AND PRESS ENTER

If I put in a different physical hard drive (older, IDE, also with
Windows XP on it), I can browse the SATA drive if it's also plugged
in. I can run programs off of it. Etc. The only thing I _can't_ do is
boot from it.

http://www.seagate.com/ww/v/index.j...toid=8bf1781e73d5d010VgnVCM100000dd04090aRCRD

 

[JAD]

I have a Seagate Barracuda 7200 250 GB SATA drive. It appears to have
a bad MBR. Why I think it has a bad MBR: It has Windows XP on it. It
will not boot into windows. Instead, it gives the error message: DISK
BOOT FAILURE, INSERT SYSTEM DISK AND PRESS ENTER

If I put in a different physical hard drive (older, IDE, also with
Windows XP on it), I can browse the SATA drive if it's also plugged
in. I can run programs off of it. Etc. The only thing I _can't_ do is
boot from it.

My ultimate goal is to restore it to being a functional primary drive
on my PC. If I have to, I can clone it to another, blank 250 gig SATA
drive (Although that won't fix the issue with it not booting). But, I
want to end up with one 250 gig SATA drive (that boots into Windows)
in my PC. After that works, I want to go back to having two SATA
drives that mirror each other (the reason I have two 250 gig drives).

Any suggestions on getting the drive working?

Gwen

here is the website for an explanation of the XP Recovery Console.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307654

you might want to try the following commands:
chkdsk
fix MBR
Fix boot

Peter has the ticket.
That will fix it if the sector is not badly damaged, just went through the same thing. The
drive is starting to go.