in lieu of swapping out hard drives

[Colin Barnhorst]

Well we all pretty much know that. What we are trying to figure out is how
to boot Windows off of a SATA drive connected to an eSATA port on an
ExpressCard/34.

 

[C.Joseph S. Drayton]

Hi Anna,

Soory I didn't get back to you last night. my DVD-RW decided last
night that it was going to take a vacation <LOL>. I got the Fedora
8 ISO burned this morning (ended up burning at 1x instead of 2x
(another project to work on . . . why did I need to burn at a
slower speed). The following is what I have done.

1) I burned the ISO on the dv8100cto.
2) shut down the dv8100cto and connected a Seagate Barracuda 7200.7
mounted in a Mapower MAP-H31SS-01 drive case connected to my
dv8100cto via an Addonics AASA2SAP15C SATA-to-eSATA converter cable
which is plugged into a Addonics ADEXC34-2E with 2 eSATA ports
which in turn is plugged into the Expresscard port on the dv8100cto.
3) Turned on the computer and presses the [Esc] key within 3
seconds of powering it on.
4) Enter my BIOS password
5) Recieve screen asking which device to boot from
6) Choose CDROM
7) Run Fedora 8
8) Choose hd2 for the installation
9) Complete installation
10) Remove CD from CDROM drive
11) Shut down Fedora 8 with an actual shutdown (not reboot)
12) Unplug ExpressCard and turn on computer
13) Get my normal grub loader;
Ubuntu loads
Windows2000pe loads
WindowsXPpe loads
14) Using the Hiren's Boot Disk v9.1 use Acronis to check and see if
any new partitions have been created on either my primary or
secondary drive. None have been created.
15) Shutdown the computer
16) Plug in ExpressCard
17) Turned on the computer and presses the [Esc] key within 3
seconds of powering it on.
18) Enter my BIOS password
19) I recieve screen asking which device to boot from
20) Select second to last option which is the external hard disk
21) Fedora 8 boots up

I plugged and unplugged, boooted from local drives, etc. about a
dozen times. Each time the external drive was connected and I chose
it, it booted up successfully. I was also able to boot my local
drives including the CDROM with the eSATA connected.

If I have time this weekend, I will boot up some of my diagnostics
disk to see if I can determine why this works since HP
'TechSupport' says it can't. I will also see if can get the system
to boot from a thumbdrive. If I understood Tim correctly, his
statement was that HP was saying that the eSATA is handled by the
BIOS the same way that USB is. Since HP actually makes an
application for creating a bootable thumbdrive I will use their
image to create the boot disk. I have found the application and
downloaded it. Again I will post results after testing.
--
C.Joseph Drayton, Ph.D. AS&T

CSD Computer Services
Web site: http://csdcs.tlerma.com/
E-mail: (e-mail address removed)

C.Joseph:
Again, thanks for the additional info.

But just to make it as clear as I can as to what our primary - if not
exclusive - objective is re this issue...

Whether using an ExpressCard device with a eSATA port in a
laptop/notebook environment that's equipped with that interface, the
user can clone (using a disk-cloning program, e.g., Acronis, Ghost,
Casper, etc.) the contents of his/her notebook's internal HDD
containing the XP OS onto a SATA HDD connected to the ExpressCard's
eSATA port and the external SATA HDD will be bootable as a result of
this disk-cloning operation.

As I've previously indicated, our experience to date using a number
of different laptop/notebook CardBus & ExpressCard devices with SATA
& eSATA ports has been negative in this regard (although we haven't
used the Addonics device that you're using).

If I've correctly understood you, you have indicated you have
achieved success in this area, i.e., as a consequence of using your
Addonics ExpressCard device with a externally connected SATA HDD, you
are able to clone the contents of the laptop/notebook's internal HDD
containing the XP OS to an external SATA HDD and that HDD will be
bootable - at least with respect to your HP notebook. And at least up
to now, the process is reliable. And I emphasize that we're talking
about the XP OS, right?

Do I have all this right? Thanks.
Anna

Hi Anna,

The most common mistake that people make when they use programs like
TrueImage is that by default, TrueImage does NOT copy the MBR.

Assuming that you do in fact have a valid clone, yes the test this
morning establishes that WindowsXP would and will boot.

The BIOS when it boots from the hard disk does not say "I will boot
Linux but not Windows" or "I wil boot Windows2000 but not WindowsXp".
It looks for an MBR on the disk. If a valid MBR exist, that is what is
loaded. The fact that I have booted both Windows and Linux from the
eSATA connected to the dv8100cto is sufficient proof for me. I will if
I have time actually use Ghost and make an image of my WindowsXP
partition and let you know the results. It is a foregone conclusion
since it let Fedora create a bootabel drive on the eSATA and then boot
from it. If it can do the partitioning and such then doing the clonig
is no problem.

Before you get rid of your current configuration, I would recommend
that you verify the bootability of the image itself by putting it into
a desktop. It won't run right since your laptop drivers and such are
different, but it will try to boot. That is what you need to know. Is
there a valid MBR and is the OS base files on the disk necessary to
begin a startup.

My question for you Anna, is when your current eSATA setup is
connected, if you enter the BIOS, does it show the drive? Whether the
connection to the ExpressCard is eSATA or PATA, the question is does
the ExpressCard slot itself realize that their is an external storage
media connected. Via the ExpressCard slot. Some ExpressCard slot (not
cards that plug into it) require additional software under a running OS
to recognize the device that is connected to it. It just like for a
while Toshiba forced people to buy their PCMCIA floppy drives because
the chipset for their slot only recognized THEIR their PCMCIA card
connected to their floppy any other PCMCIA based floppy would not boot
and could ony be accessed from a running OS with the OS drivers loaded
for that PCMCIA card.

--

C.Joseph Drayton, Ph.D. AS&T

CSD Computer Services
Web site: http://csdcs.tlerma.com/
E-mail: (e-mail address removed)

 

[C.Joseph S. Drayton]

Booting from a USB flash device may be more
universally successful as I see from the Dell support
website's User Manuals that virtually all Dell's
current PCs list "USB Device" as a bootable device type,
and the text refers to it as a "memory device". But when
I asked Dell's Tech Support reps whether that includes
hard drives connected via USB, they always said that the
system couldn't boot from a USB hard drive.

*TimDaniels*





If I understood Tim correctly, his statement was that HP

Okay Tim,

I have a 2.5" empty drive case and an old Hitachi drive that I can
throw into it to test.

This problem is really becoming quite the project <LOL> considering it
already works for me and I havew no use for it. I will though see what
I can learn this weekend.

--

C.Joseph Drayton, Ph.D. AS&T

CSD Computer Services
Web site: http://csdcs.tlerma.com/
E-mail: (e-mail address removed)

 

[Timothy Daniels]

Okay Tim,

I have a 2.5" empty drive case and an old Hitachi drive
that I can throw into it to test.

This problem is really becoming quite the project <LOL>
considering it already works for me and I havew no use
for it. I will though see what I can learn this weekend.

Thanks for your experimentations on our behalf. This
booting from an external drive is a major difference for
some of us between desktops and laptops.

*TimDaniels*

 

[Anna]

Anna wrote...

C.Joseph:
Again, thanks for the additional info.

But just to make it as clear as I can as to what our primary - if >not
exclusive - objective is re this issue...

Whether using an ExpressCard device with a eSATA port in a
laptop/notebook environment that's equipped with that interface, >the user
can clone (using a disk-cloning program, e.g., Acronis, >Ghost, Casper,
etc.) the contents of his/her notebook's internal >HDD containing the XP OS
onto a SATA HDD connected to the >ExpressCard's eSATA port and the external
SATA HDD will be >bootable as a result of this disk-cloning operation.

As I've previously indicated, our experience to date using a >number of
different laptop/notebook CardBus & ExpressCard >devices with SATA & eSATA
ports has been negative in this >regard (although we haven't used the
Addonics device that you're >using).

If I've correctly understood you, you have indicated you have
achieved success in this area, i.e., as a consequence of using your
Addonics ExpressCard device with a externally connected SATA >HDD, you are
able to clone the contents of the >laptop/notebook's internal HDD
containing the XP OS to an >external SATA HDD and that HDD will be
bootable - at least >with respect to your HP notebook. And at least up to
now, the >process is reliable. And I emphasize that we're talking about the
Do I have all this right? Thanks.
Anna

(SNIP)...

My question for you Anna, is when your current eSATA setup is
connected, if you enter the BIOS, does it show the drive? Whether the
connection to the ExpressCard is eSATA or PATA, the question is does
the ExpressCard slot itself realize that their is an external storage
media connected. Via the ExpressCard slot. Some ExpressCard slot (not
cards that plug into it) require additional software under a running OS
to recognize the device that is connected to it. It just like for a
while Toshiba forced people to buy their PCMCIA floppy drives because
the chipset for their slot only recognized THEIR their PCMCIA card
connected to their floppy any other PCMCIA based floppy would not boot
and could ony be accessed from a running OS with the OS drivers loaded
for that PCMCIA card.
--
C.Joseph Drayton, Ph.D. AS&T

CSD Computer Services
Web site: http://csdcs.tlerma.com/
E-mail: (e-mail address removed)

C.Joseph...
As I previously indicated we've worked with about three different makes of
ExpressCard/34 devices in conjunction with various laptop/notebooks. As I
recall drivers were provided and installed in each case. We have not worked
with the Addonics device you previously mentioned.

In no case were we able to boot to the cloned external eSATA HDD connected
through the ExpressCard interface. The connected SATA HDD was not detected
in the BIOS as a bootable device. We encountered no problems re data
transfer between the laptop/notebook's internal HDD & external SATA HDD.
Again, I emphasize that all our experience is within an XP environment. We
are uninterested in any other OS re this issue.
Anna

 

[Timothy Daniels]

Anna-

You may be interested to know that the Dell Optiplex 755
has a built-in eSATA port on its motherboard and a back panel
eSATA connector bracket. (The short cable running from the
motherboard's eSATA port to the eSATA bracket is a regular
SATA cable.) According to the eSATA descriptive webpage
for that machine, eSATA can be enabled in the BIOS. Dell's
Tech Support says that the enablement also allows booting
from the eSATA port, but... the rep and his colleaques couldn't
find any documentation that spefically mentions booting from the
eSATA port. It would be interesting to find that out.
http://support.dell.com/support/top...322F45CF605E5D50E040A68F5B284B8C&doclang=en#2

Here is the Optiplex 755 User's Guide with the "System Setup"
section mentioning the enablement of eSATA:
http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/op755/EN/UG/HTML/advfeat.htm#wp1132957

*TimDaniels*

 

[Anna]

Anna-

You may be interested to know that the Dell Optiplex 755
has a built-in eSATA port on its motherboard and a back panel
eSATA connector bracket. (The short cable running from the
motherboard's eSATA port to the eSATA bracket is a regular
SATA cable.) According to the eSATA descriptive webpage
for that machine, eSATA can be enabled in the BIOS. Dell's
Tech Support says that the enablement also allows booting
from the eSATA port, but... the rep and his colleaques couldn't
find any documentation that spefically mentions booting from the
eSATA port. It would be interesting to find that out.
http://support.dell.com/support/top...322F45CF605E5D50E040A68F5B284B8C&doclang=en#2

Here is the Optiplex 755 User's Guide with the "System Setup"
section mentioning the enablement of eSATA:
http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/op755/EN/UG/HTML/advfeat.htm#wp1132957

*TimDaniels*

Tim:
Thanks for the info. We've been wondering for some time why the latest
generation of notebooks are not generally equipped with at least one eSATA
port in addition to the ubiquitous USB ports. The technology is certainly
there and it would seem the additional cost involved comes close to being
trifling in the scheme of things.

The advantages of having an available eSATA port - whether on a desktop
machine or a notebook - are certainly significant given the substantial data
transfer rate of a SATA HDD as compared with a USB device. And the fact that
an *external* SATA HDD is a bootable device with SATA-to-SATA connectivity
is an enormous advantage, or so it seems to me.

Although I haven't worked with the Dell notebook you mention, I've little
doubt that an external SATA HDD connected to the Dell's eSATA port would be
a bootable device. Every desktop motherboard we've worked with that contains
a eSATA port has provided boot capability when a SATA HDD was connected to
the port. I see no reason why the Dell should work any differently.

BTW, a number of desktop PC cases - the Antec Sonata III enclosure being a
prime example - now contain a eSATA port on the front panel, usually
side-by-side to one or more USB ports. A SATA data cable is permanently
attached to the eSATA port and is simply connected to one of the
motherboard's SATA connectors, thus providing SATA-to-SATA connectivity.
That the system will now be able to treat an *external* HDD as an *internal*
HDD, yet allow for simple physical removal or connection of the external
device, i.e., "hot plugging" - "hot swapping" capability similar to that of
a USB device, and at the same time provide "bootability" of such a device
are certainly significant advantages of this hardware configuration.
Anna

 

[C.Joseph S. Drayton]

C.Joseph...
As I previously indicated we've worked with about three different
makes of ExpressCard/34 devices in conjunction with various
laptop/notebooks. As I recall drivers were provided and installed in
each case. We have not worked with the Addonics device you previously
mentioned.

In no case were we able to boot to the cloned external eSATA HDD
connected through the ExpressCard interface. The connected SATA HDD
was not detected in the BIOS as a bootable device. We encountered no
problems re data transfer between the laptop/notebook's internal HDD
& external SATA HDD. Again, I emphasize that all our experience is
within an XP environment. We are uninterested in any other OS re this
issue. Anna

Hi Anna,

What I am trying to explain to you is that your HARDWARE needs to
recognize the device without any software device drivers. That is why I
am asking you if your BIOS sees the drive.

If your BIOS does not see the drive, than it CAN NEVER be a bootable
device. If your ExpressCard port requires drivers to recognize the card
in the port than the answer is NO you can not make the device (no
matter what expressCard you use) bootable.

Booting is not initiated by the OS. Booting is initiatedby the BIOS. So
I repeat you must confirm that your BIOS can see the drive.

The easiest way to do this is to enter the BIOS setup screen and look
on the screen that tells you what disk are connected. Depending on your
BIOS, you would normally use [F10], [Del] or [F2]. On my machine, I
just hit [Esc] and the bottom option on my Boot device menu is the
option to enter the BIOS setup program. Note you have to enter the BIOS
before the first Windows screen comes up.

Also, you need to make sure that booting from another drive is
activated. I keep confidential data on my computer, so I keep booting
from all devices other than the primary hard disk disabled. When I need
to boot from the CDROM, I change the setting. When I am finished with
the CDROM, I disable booting from it again.

Because there are freeware CD ISO images that contain software to
remove the administrator password from Windows, I make sure that a
person can not simply put a CD in and boot to it and by-pass Windows
security.

--

Sincerely,
C.Joseph Drayton, Ph.D. AS&T

CSD Computer Services
Web site: http://csdcs.tlerma.com/
E-mail: (e-mail address removed)

 

[Timothy Daniels]

Anna-

You may be interested to know that the Dell Optiplex 755
has a built-in eSATA port on its motherboard and a back panel
eSATA connector bracket. (The short cable running from the
motherboard's eSATA port to the eSATA bracket is a regular
SATA cable.) According to the eSATA descriptive webpage
for that machine, eSATA can be enabled in the BIOS. Dell's
Tech Support says that the enablement also allows booting
from the eSATA port, but... the rep and his colleaques couldn't
find any documentation that spefically mentions booting from the
eSATA port. It would be interesting to find that out.
http://support.dell.com/support/top...322F45CF605E5D50E040A68F5B284B8C&doclang=en#2

Here is the Optiplex 755 User's Guide with the "System Setup"
section mentioning the enablement of eSATA:
http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/op755/EN/UG/HTML/advfeat.htm#wp1132957

*TimDaniels*

......I've little doubt that an external SATA HDD connected
to the Dell's eSATA port would be a bootable device. Every
desktop motherboard we've worked with that contains a eSATA
port has provided boot capability when a SATA HDD was connected
to the port. I see no reason why the Dell should work any differently.

BTW, a number of desktop PC cases - the Antec Sonata III
enclosure being a prime example - now contain a eSATA port
on the front panel, usually side-by-side to one or more USB
ports. A SATA data cable is permanently attached to the eSATA
port and is simply connected to one of the motherboard's SATA
connectors, thus providing SATA-to-SATA connectivity. [....]
Anna

Thanks for sharing your experience with the bootability of
HDs via eSATA. It adds a lot of flexibility to a system.

That Sonata III case sounds like intelligent design - putting the
eSATA port on the *front* of the case for better accessibility.
I wish the full-system PC manufacturers would do the same.

*TimDaniels*

 

[C.Joseph S. Drayton]

Hi Anna,

Soory I didn't get back to you last night. my DVD-RW decided last
night that it was going to take a vacation <LOL>. I got the Fedora
8 ISO burned this morning (ended up burning at 1x instead of 2x
(another project to work on . . . why did I need to burn at a
slower speed). The following is what I have done.

1) I burned the ISO on the dv8100cto.
2) shut down the dv8100cto and connected a Seagate Barracuda 7200.7
mounted in a Mapower MAP-H31SS-01 drive case connected to my
dv8100cto via an Addonics AASA2SAP15C SATA-to-eSATA converter cable
which is plugged into a Addonics ADEXC34-2E with 2 eSATA ports
which in turn is plugged into the Expresscard port on the dv8100cto.
3) Turned on the computer and presses the [Esc] key within 3
seconds of powering it on.
4) Enter my BIOS password
5) Recieve screen asking which device to boot from
6) Choose CDROM
7) Run Fedora 8
8) Choose hd2 for the installation
9) Complete installation
10) Remove CD from CDROM drive
11) Shut down Fedora 8 with an actual shutdown (not reboot)
12) Unplug ExpressCard and turn on computer
13) Get my normal grub loader;
Ubuntu loads
Windows2000pe loads
WindowsXPpe loads
14) Using the Hiren's Boot Disk v9.1 use Acronis to check and see if
any new partitions have been created on either my primary or
secondary drive. None have been created.
15) Shutdown the computer
16) Plug in ExpressCard
17) Turned on the computer and presses the [Esc] key within 3
seconds of powering it on.
18) Enter my BIOS password
19) I recieve screen asking which device to boot from
20) Select second to last option which is the external hard disk
21) Fedora 8 boots up

I plugged and unplugged, boooted from local drives, etc. about a
dozen times. Each time the external drive was connected and I chose
it, it booted up successfully. I was also able to boot my local
drives including the CDROM with the eSATA connected.

If I have time this weekend, I will boot up some of my diagnostics
disk to see if I can determine why this works since HP
'TechSupport' says it can't. I will also see if can get the system
to boot from a thumbdrive. If I understood Tim correctly, his
statement was that HP was saying that the eSATA is handled by the
BIOS the same way that USB is. Since HP actually makes an
application for creating a bootable thumbdrive I will use their
image to create the boot disk. I have found the application and
downloaded it. Again I will post results after testing.
--
C.Joseph Drayton, Ph.D. AS&T

CSD Computer Services
Web site: http://csdcs.tlerma.com/
E-mail: (e-mail address removed)

C.Joseph:
Again, thanks for the additional info.

But just to make it as clear as I can as to what our primary - if not
exclusive - objective is re this issue...

Whether using an ExpressCard device with a eSATA port in a
laptop/notebook environment that's equipped with that interface, the
user can clone (using a disk-cloning program, e.g., Acronis, Ghost,
Casper, etc.) the contents of his/her notebook's internal HDD
containing the XP OS onto a SATA HDD connected to the ExpressCard's
eSATA port and the external SATA HDD will be bootable as a result of
this disk-cloning operation.

As I've previously indicated, our experience to date using a number
of different laptop/notebook CardBus & ExpressCard devices with SATA
& eSATA ports has been negative in this regard (although we haven't
used the Addonics device that you're using).

If I've correctly understood you, you have indicated you have
achieved success in this area, i.e., as a consequence of using your
Addonics ExpressCard device with a externally connected SATA HDD, you
are able to clone the contents of the laptop/notebook's internal HDD
containing the XP OS to an external SATA HDD and that HDD will be
bootable - at least with respect to your HP notebook. And at least up
to now, the process is reliable. And I emphasize that we're talking
about the XP OS, right?

Do I have all this right? Thanks.
Anna

Hi Anna,

I finally got around to do a test that will hopefully answer your
question definitively. I followed the below steps;

1) removed primary drive from my dv8100cto
2) removed secondary drive from my dv8100cto
3) put Hitachi 40Gb hard drive into position drive position 1
4) turned on booting from CDROM
5) Installed WindowsXPpe (full retail)
6) removed CD and turned off booting from CDROM
7) Booted from drive installed WindowsXPpe drive. I'm sure it worked
because it asked to be activated. Rebooted it 6 times all six times
worked fine.
8) Turned on booting from CDROM
9) Connected Addonics ExpressCard connected to Mapower box with Seagate
SATA drive in it
10) Booted Hiren's v9.1
11) Ran Ghost
12) Shut down computer
13) Pulled Hotachi hard disk from position 1 (there was now NO hard
disk in the machine).
14) Removed CD from CDROM
15) Kept ExpressCard plugged in
16) Got a screen I had not gotten before.
A screen that looks like my Select Boot Device screen instead
though it said;

IDE Channel -- None

Then it gave me a boot drive list, it showed;

CDROM
Ext - Hard disk
Network
17) Selected choice '2' (Ext - Hard disk)
18) WindowsXPpe booted and Uncle Bill reminded me that I needed to
activate.
19) Tried rebooting a couple of times got the same screen each time.

I had never pulled both drives to see what the computer would do . . .
Now I know.

To be honest, I don't know why this worked. I was going to do some
experimenting this weekend so I could try to explain to the folks here
'why' things are happening, but didn't have the time (spent 9 hours
yesterday fighting with a network that has 2 Tivos on it that refuse to
see each other (ended up being faulty wi-fi router <bllaaahhhh>)). It
works, and when I have time I will try to determine why.

--

Sincerely,
C.Joseph Drayton, Ph.D. AS&T

CSD Computer Services
Web site: http://csdcs.tlerma.com/
E-mail: (e-mail address removed)

 

[C.Joseph S. Drayton]

Hi Anna,

Soory I didn't get back to you last night. my DVD-RW decided last
night that it was going to take a vacation <LOL>. I got the Fedora
8 ISO burned this morning (ended up burning at 1x instead of 2x
(another project to work on . . . why did I need to burn at a
slower speed). The following is what I have done.

1) I burned the ISO on the dv8100cto.
2) shut down the dv8100cto and connected a Seagate Barracuda
7200.7 mounted in a Mapower MAP-H31SS-01 drive case connected to
my dv8100cto via an Addonics AASA2SAP15C SATA-to-eSATA converter
cable which is plugged into a Addonics ADEXC34-2E with 2 eSATA
ports which in turn is plugged into the Expresscard port on the
dv8100cto. 3) Turned on the computer and presses the [Esc] key
within 3 seconds of powering it on.
4) Enter my BIOS password
5) Recieve screen asking which device to boot from
6) Choose CDROM
7) Run Fedora 8
8) Choose hd2 for the installation
9) Complete installation
10) Remove CD from CDROM drive
11) Shut down Fedora 8 with an actual shutdown (not reboot)
12) Unplug ExpressCard and turn on computer
13) Get my normal grub loader;
Ubuntu loads
Windows2000pe loads
WindowsXPpe loads
14) Using the Hiren's Boot Disk v9.1 use Acronis to check and see
if any new partitions have been created on either my primary or
secondary drive. None have been created.
15) Shutdown the computer
16) Plug in ExpressCard
17) Turned on the computer and presses the [Esc] key within 3
seconds of powering it on.
18) Enter my BIOS password
19) I recieve screen asking which device to boot from
20) Select second to last option which is the external hard disk
21) Fedora 8 boots up

I plugged and unplugged, boooted from local drives, etc. about a
dozen times. Each time the external drive was connected and I
chose it, it booted up successfully. I was also able to boot my
local drives including the CDROM with the eSATA connected.

If I have time this weekend, I will boot up some of my diagnostics
disk to see if I can determine why this works since HP
'TechSupport' says it can't. I will also see if can get the
system to boot from a thumbdrive. If I understood Tim correctly,
his statement was that HP was saying that the eSATA is handled by
the BIOS the same way that USB is. Since HP actually makes an
application for creating a bootable thumbdrive I will use their
image to create the boot disk. I have found the application and
downloaded it. Again I will post results after testing.
--
C.Joseph Drayton, Ph.D. AS&T

CSD Computer Services
Web site: http://csdcs.tlerma.com/
E-mail: (e-mail address removed)

C.Joseph:
Again, thanks for the additional info.

But just to make it as clear as I can as to what our primary - if
not exclusive - objective is re this issue...

Whether using an ExpressCard device with a eSATA port in a
laptop/notebook environment that's equipped with that interface, the
user can clone (using a disk-cloning program, e.g., Acronis, Ghost,
Casper, etc.) the contents of his/her notebook's internal HDD
containing the XP OS onto a SATA HDD connected to the ExpressCard's
eSATA port and the external SATA HDD will be bootable as a result of
this disk-cloning operation.

As I've previously indicated, our experience to date using a number
of different laptop/notebook CardBus & ExpressCard devices with SATA
& eSATA ports has been negative in this regard (although we haven't
used the Addonics device that you're using).

If I've correctly understood you, you have indicated you have
achieved success in this area, i.e., as a consequence of using your
Addonics ExpressCard device with a externally connected SATA HDD,
you are able to clone the contents of the laptop/notebook's
internal HDD containing the XP OS to an external SATA HDD and that
HDD will be bootable - at least with respect to your HP notebook.
And at least up to now, the process is reliable. And I emphasize
that we're talking about the XP OS, right?

Do I have all this right? Thanks.
Anna

Hi Anna,

I finally got around to do a test that will hopefully answer your
question definitively. I followed the below steps;

1) removed primary drive from my dv8100cto
2) removed secondary drive from my dv8100cto
3) put Hitachi 40Gb hard drive into position drive position 1
4) turned on booting from CDROM
5) Installed WindowsXPpe (full retail)
6) removed CD and turned off booting from CDROM
7) Booted from drive installed WindowsXPpe drive. I'm sure it worked
because it asked to be activated. Rebooted it 6 times all six times
worked fine.
8) Turned on booting from CDROM
9) Connected Addonics ExpressCard connected to Mapower box with
Seagate SATA drive in it
10) Booted Hiren's v9.1
11) Ran Ghost
12) Shut down computer
13) Pulled Hotachi hard disk from position 1 (there was now NO hard
disk in the machine).
14) Removed CD from CDROM
15) Kept ExpressCard plugged in
16) Got a screen I had not gotten before.
A screen that looks like my Select Boot Device screen instead
though it said;

IDE Channel -- None

Then it gave me a boot drive list, it showed;

CDROM
Ext - Hard disk
Network
17) Selected choice '2' (Ext - Hard disk)
18) WindowsXPpe booted and Uncle Bill reminded me that I needed to
activate.
19) Tried rebooting a couple of times got the same screen each time.

I had never pulled both drives to see what the computer would do . . .
Now I know.

To be honest, I don't know why this worked. I was going to do some
experimenting this weekend so I could try to explain to the folks here
'why' things are happening, but didn't have the time (spent 9 hours
yesterday fighting with a network that has 2 Tivos on it that refuse
to see each other (ended up being faulty wi-fi router
<bllaaahhhh>)). It works, and when I have time I will try to
determine why.

I've finally had some time to start dissecting what is occuring, and
since I got a few e-mails about the procedure I thought I do a partial
followup.

First of all, my BIOS can recognize a USB device without an OS loaded.
next I found that different versions of Ghost seem to work better for
different people when it comes to recognition of USB drives. I use the
Hiren's disk since it has a lot of utilities on it that I use and have
not had it fail me yet.

I have had some people tell me that they get better USB hard disk
recognition with boot disk floppy image created with Ghost 2003 where
they selected USB support.

The first thing that threw me was my boot screen telling me that there
was no IDE. I found out that it was actually saying 'No IDE0' since I
had no hard disk installed and the DVD-RW is on IDE1, that actually
makes sense.

The next thing I found was that you MUST bring up the machine from a
powered down state with the ExpressCard in. Doing a re-boot will not
'reliably' show the device (it does occassionally and I haven't spotted
a pattern to it yet')

One of the things I don't understand is that if you put that 3.5 inch
drive into a desktop, it won't boot. It seems that when it is connected
to the ExpressCard, the SATA drivers for Windows XP are not required.
When I stick it in my roommates desktop, it needs the SATA drivers off
of the WindowsXP install disk.

My laptop does not have a SATA connection in it so I could not try this
test with a 2.5" and put it directly into the computer.

As near as I can tell, the ExpressCard being used is the determining
factor. I don't have any other ExpressCard to test to say that
definitively, But I have plugged my ExpressCard into a desktop that had
an ExpressCard port add-in and it worked.

--

Sincerely,
C.Joseph Drayton, Ph.D. AS&T

CSD Computer Services
Web site: http://csdcs.tlerma.com/
E-mail: (e-mail address removed)

 

[Anna]

(SNIP)

The next thing I found was that you MUST bring up the machine from a
powered down state with the ExpressCard in. Doing a re-boot will not
'reliably' show the device (it does occassionally and I haven't spotted
a pattern to it yet')

One of the things I don't understand is that if you put that 3.5 inch
drive into a desktop, it won't boot. It seems that when it is connected
to the ExpressCard, the SATA drivers for Windows XP are not required.
When I stick it in my roommates desktop, it needs the SATA drivers off
of the WindowsXP install disk.

My laptop does not have a SATA connection in it so I could not try this
test with a 2.5" and put it directly into the computer.

As near as I can tell, the ExpressCard being used is the determining
factor. I don't have any other ExpressCard to test to say that
definitively, But I have plugged my ExpressCard into a desktop that had
an ExpressCard port add-in and it worked.
--
Sincerely,
C.Joseph Drayton, Ph.D. AS&T

CSD Computer Services
Web site: http://csdcs.tlerma.com/
E-mail: (e-mail address removed)

C. Joseph...
Thanks again for the add'l info concerning the eSATA ExpressCard and its
capability in terms of booting from a SATA-connected HDD containing the XP
OS.

A colleague of mine is experimenting with a number of different makes of
eSATA ExpressCards and a variety of notebooks to determine whether this boot
capability is universal among these devices. Unfortunately he's presently
out of the country so it will be a while before I'm able to communicate with
him re this issue. I'll pass on any interesting and/or relevant info when I
do.

BTW, could you provide me with the make/model of that desktop ExpressCard
add-on that you mention? Is it designed for installation in a PCI slot?
Anna