er wtf? Computer won't boot from cdrom when HD is attached

[Ns1]

It's been a while so I apologize in advance for an errors in technical terms


So I need to do a repair install on windows. I have 2 ata/133 devices, a HD and a dvd rom.
There is only one IDE channel on the motherboard.

Any combination of setting master/slave drivers does not let me boot from cd. They are currently set in CS mode, with the HD getting the master end, and the dvd drive getting the slave center; still failure.

When I have only the dvd player hooked up to the cable, it'll boot from CD fine. As soon as the HD comes into play, it won't boot from CD. The MB diagnostics appear to detect the DVD rom drive just fine, with both devices are hooked up. However, when I hit the "boot menu", it won't detect the DVD drive.

My current solution is to just get a freaking SATA dvd burner.

However, any input on troubleshooting the above issue would be appreciated.

 

[Denithor]

I've been in exactly your situation twice now when upgrading people's old systems to newer mobos with only one IDE port.

Never found a workaround, had to pull my SATA DVDRW out of my gaming rig to do the initial install, then everything worked fine.

I do know in both cases I ended up using the HDD on the first port on the cable and the DVDRW as the final device with both set to CS. So I could mount the HDD in a holder & still reach the DVD drive above it with the same cable. Stupid single IDE port boards...

 

[Ns1]

Originally posted by: Denithor
I've been in exactly your situation twice now when upgrading people's old systems to newer mobos with only one IDE port.

Never found a workaround, had to pull my SATA DVDRW out of my gaming rig to do the initial install, then everything worked fine.

I do know in both cases I ended up using the HDD on the first port on the cable and the DVDRW as the final device with both set to CS. So I could mount the HDD in a holder & still reach the DVD drive above it with the same cable. Stupid single IDE port boards...

Well, I guess it's kind of comforting that I'm not an isolated incident.

 

[Slugbait]

A common system tweak to decrease the amount of time it takes to boot a machine is to change the boot settings in the BIOS to make the hard drive the first in the chain.

So my guess is that this is your current BIOS settings. Change it so it will look to the optical drive first.

 

[Denithor]

That wasn't the case in my problems, but yeah, worth making sure your BIOS checks the CDROM as the first boot drive.

 

[Ns1]

Originally posted by: Slugbait
A common system tweak to decrease the amount of time it takes to boot a machine is to change the boot settings in the BIOS to make the hard drive the first in the chain.

So my guess is that this is your current BIOS settings. Change it so it will look to the optical drive first.

already done.

1. cd 2. hd 3. floppy

won't boot that way, wont' boot from CD using the boot agent either.

 

[bamacre]

Originally posted by: Ns1

Originally posted by: Slugbait
A common system tweak to decrease the amount of time it takes to boot a machine is to change the boot settings in the BIOS to make the hard drive the first in the chain.

So my guess is that this is your current BIOS settings. Change it so it will look to the optical drive first.

already done.

1. cd 2. hd 3. floppy

won't boot that way, wont' boot from CD using the boot agent either.

Will the BIOS allow you to disable everything but the CD drive as a boot device?

I remember a certain model Dell a year back or so that game me a similar problem. Even though the Optical drive was selected as the primary boot device, it would still boot from the hard drive first.

I solved it simply by disabling the hard drive as a boot device, forcing the system to boot from the optical drive.

 

[Ns1]

Originally posted by: bamacre

Originally posted by: Ns1

Originally posted by: Slugbait
A common system tweak to decrease the amount of time it takes to boot a machine is to change the boot settings in the BIOS to make the hard drive the first in the chain.

So my guess is that this is your current BIOS settings. Change it so it will look to the optical drive first.

already done.

1. cd 2. hd 3. floppy

won't boot that way, wont' boot from CD using the boot agent either.

Will the BIOS allow you to disable everything but the CD drive as a boot device?

I remember a certain model Dell a year back or so that game me a similar problem. Even though the Optical drive was selected as the primary boot device, it would still boot from the hard drive first.

I solved it simply by disabling the hard drive as a boot device, forcing the system to boot from the optical drive.

Unfortunately not as far as I can tell 🙁

I hope my drive gets here tomorrow.

 

[Arcanedeath]

Try puting the optical drive on the end of the cable and not using cable select. Set the optical drive to master and the HDD to slave w/ jumpers and test again, many optical drives doesn't play nice when they are not the master on the channel.

 

[VirtualLarry]

The spec says that ATAPI devices (DVD-ROM) are supposed to be slaved to ATA devices (hard drive). I've always done it that way without a problem. When using a single IDE cable to run both the HD and DVD/CD, I jumper the HD for master and the DVD/CD as slave, and don't mess around with CS.

I'm curious, what bootable CD are you trying to run? It's been my experience that the Windows bootable CDs check the MBR on the HD, and behave differently depending on what they find, including not allowing you to boot off of them at all if they get confused by what they find in the MBR.

Try a different bootable CD, like Memtest86+, and see if that boots, when both the HD and DVD are connected (with HD jumperd to Master, and DVD to Slave). If it boots, then the problem is the MBR on the HD, not the BIOS or settings.