I have a very bizarre problem. I cannot boot from any hard drive. I know that in and of itself isn’t bizarre, but the following seems to be….
If I put a Windows XP disk in the CD drive and both the hard drive and optical drive are connected, it will boot past POST and then stop with a flashing cursor. If I disconnect the hard drive, it will boot past POST, read the CD and run setup. I’ve check the BIOS and the hard drive is recognized and it’s setup to boot from CD first. I’ve tried another known good hard drive, tried changing cables and IDE slots. Even cleared CMOS. I’ve pretty much tried every configuration that I can think of. Nothing seems to work.
Has anyone every encountered this issue? I’m thinking MOBO but am confused as the optical drive works on both the primary and secondary IDE channels.
Any help would certainly be appreciated.
Windows XP Home
Compaq Presario S4120WM