Can't boot without Win XP Disk

Check in bios to make sure your HD is a primary on the first channel rather than a secondary or on the second channel... if it is wrong, you will need to open the box and rectify this. The most likely is on the wrong channel rather than secondary, but either error would cause the behavior you are experiencing.

If the above checks out, I would make sure the partition is set to active in Fdisk, and as a last resort, play with the bios settings for boot order.

Good Luck

The one item that you didn't mention here is the type of HDD. If it's a SATA one you'll need to do a clean install and this time make sure that you install the SATA drivers provided by ABit.

It also helps a lot if you have the SATA Drive connected to the first Drive port and not one of the others.

I tend to think that the problem here is that you need the Default Windows Drivers for the SATA controller and that is why you need the Windows CD in the drive.

Col

Thank you all for your input. I should have given you more information to start.
I have two ATA133 Seagate disks. C: ST3802110A, D: ST3120022A (with 3 partitions) both connected to the IDE connector. Disk C is master and has only 1 partition. I did an FDISK and format, using a Win 98 boot floppy and marked the C: partition as active. I then did a clean full windows install booting form the WIN XP Pro. (I have been through this process twice, getting the same results both times. I finally gave up and now just keep the Install CD in the drive to have handy whenever I need to re-boot; but not a good long term solution. The message press any key to boot from CD comes up, and I just wait until it then boots from the HDD.)

The second disk is connected as Slave. I also have a DVD drive connected via an SATA adapter to one of the SATA connectors on the motherboard. I have tried disconnecting all devices (the floppy, and the DVD drive) and it will still not boot from the HDD directly.

My current boot order is Floppy, CD, HDD. If I put HDD first, then I get the "Disk boot failure message".

Here are the contents of the boot.ini file:
[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS [operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect /NoExecute=OptIn

It looks like the boot.ini file is ok. But if you think trying the ?bootcfg /rebuild? will make a difference, I will give it a try.
Thanks for any new suggestions that might help.

Harry Sterling

Thank you all for your input. I should have given you more information to start.
I have two ATA133 Seagate disks. C: ST3802110A, D: ST3120022A (with 3 partitions) both connected to the IDE connector. Disk C is master and has only 1 partition. I did an FDISK and format, using a Win 98 boot floppy and marked the C: partition as active. I then did a clean full windows install booting form the WIN XP Pro. (I have been through this process twice, getting the same results both times. I finally gave up and now just keep the Install CD in the drive to have handy whenever I need to re-boot; but not a good long term solution. The message press any key to boot from CD comes up, and I just wait until it then boots from the HDD.)

The second disk is connected as Slave. I also have a DVD drive connected via an SATA adapter to one of the SATA connectors on the motherboard. I have tried disconnecting all devices (the floppy, and the DVD drive) and it will still not boot from the HDD directly.

My current boot order is Floppy, CD, HDD. If I put HDD first, then I get the "Disk boot failure message".

Here are the contents of the boot.ini file:
[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS [operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect /NoExecute=OptIn

It looks like the boot.ini file is ok. But if you think trying the ?bootcfg /rebuild? will make a difference, I will give it a try.
Thanks for any new suggestions that might help.

Harry Sterling

Tried the bootcfg /rebuild and it did not make a difference. Still having to keep the Windows Cd in the drive in order to boot windows from the hard drive. I would appreciate any other suggestions.
Thanks
Harry

Sorry to cut across this one - I'm having the exact same problem as the original poster. I tried a fresh install on a new disk (All the disks are Ultra ATA 133). I wonder did the original poster get the problem resolved?

Gerry

To answer the question posed in answer 8, NO I did not get the problem resolved. I tried all the suggestions and am still having to boot with the Windows XP install disk in the DVD drive in order to boot. I am open to more suggestions.
Harry

Hi Harry, I was wondering if you managed to find out what was causing your problems with booting-up. I am having the exact same problem. I cannot boot unless I have the Win Xp cd in the drive.

Jason.

Even i face a similar situation *sometimes*. At random times (~once in 2 weeks) while starting up the system gives me "DISK BOOT FAILURE, INSERT SYSTEM DISK AND PRESS ENTER". i just press the reset button and the system starts up normally. I have attributed this problem to faulty signals from the power supply. but since this occurs all the time for you, i guess you should try installing windows on the other hard drive ( u said you had 2 ATA hard drives). if even that doesnt work, u should give the power supply a trial.

kedia

Your problem is probably fixed by now but this is a pretty common error so for future readers......

You might have the computer set to boot to the Hard Drive, doesn't matter, make sure you have the correct hard drive selected as the FIRST hard drive in the BIOS. If they are IDE, make sure the Master/Slave settings are correct. If they are SATA, just make sure the correct SATA drive is selected (in the BIOS) as the first Hard Drive to boot from.

A common boot order is Floppy, Hard Drive then CD ROM -- and this boot order is just fine.

If u have 2 identical hard drives just switch them around in the boot order section of the BIOS.

Good Luck

I had the same problem. Here is what worked for me.

The bios was set to boot from removable drives, then cd, then hard drive. All seems ok with this, however under further inspection I found that the hard drive priority (separate setting in boot area of the bios) was set with my raid array first and my system drive second. I moved the system drive to the first in the priority list and shabang it worked!!

Why does it work with the CD? Here is my guess: With the cd in the drive, it boots from the CD. Yeah it says "Press any key to boot from the CD..." and you ignore it, but really once it says that it has already booted from the CD. When you ignore the prompt it then tries to load the operating system from the first hard drive it sees instead of passing the booting back to the BIOS. I don't know if that is what really happens, but its my guess.

Problem: Whatever steps taken up to now, XP will not boot without the CD inserted. (As an added bonus, this may happen to be a DELL Optiplex.)

Solution: Since the system WILL boot with the XP Setup (Boot) CD inserted, I agree with the previous post, the BIOS hands off to the CD and then the CD passes off to the first bootable partition it finds. Without the CD, the BIOS doesn't find a bootable partition. I seem to have this problem more when using DELL Optiplex systems. The only other way I could make it boot was to activate the F12 Boot Menu and choose the hard drive. In my case, I was able to install a secondary PCI SATA controller card, boot XP again w/ the CD inserted and install the SATA card drivers in XP. I then rebooted, activated the AHCI/RAID adapter mode in the BIOS settings, changed the boot order to boot to the secondary SATA adapter FIRST and shut down. I connected the primary XP hard drive to the secondary SATA adapter, another hard drive to SATA 0 so the DELL BIOS wouldn't complain about no drive connected to SATA 0. Next, I booted into XP again with the boot hard drive connected to the secondary SATA card. XP detected the AHCI SATA controller (I had enabled in the BIOS previously) and I provided the drivers I had from DELL. Then I installed the Matrix Storage Controller software obtained from DELL or Intel. I shut down, removed everything and reconnected the XP boot hard drive to SATA 0, the optical drive to SATA 1, cleaned up the BIOS settings and XP booted normally with full support for AHCI, etc. Problem solved. Other things that will cause untold problems is trying to take a drive that was previously loaded with Vista/Win7 and just restoring a drive image over them without properly wiping the disk. The old boot sector may survive and cause similar symptoms. Hope this helps!