Major hard drive problems, please help me!

[MichaelB5]

Ok, well, it all started when I was uninstalling Microsoft Visual Studio 6.0. (Note: I am running Windows 2000 Professional) The uninstall had just completed and I was closing off apps so I could restart when out of no where explorer crashes and says that it will shut down in 1 minute. 5 seconds go by and the screen goes blank for a couple of milliseconds and then that blue screen pops up saying something that I couldn't read (it popped up fast and then my computer restarted). Upon restarting, I get yet another blue screen saying INACCESSIBLE_BOOT_DEVICE. I thought that this was no problem, but I was wrong. I tried last known good boot, safe mode, checking the hardware, you name it. I finally gave up and I was trying to back up my data by getting another hard drive from a second computer (second computer runs Windows 98). I made the second hard drive the master and the first one the slave and it booted up fine except that it couldn't read my first hard drive or something. So I shut it down and change the jumpers. When I started it back up I get "Ultra66 BIOS not installed" then "No Operating System Found". So I took the second hard drive and put it back in its computer only to find out that it gives me those errors (Ultra66 BIOS not installed then Operating System Not Found). Upon closer examination I see that there seems to be no activity in the second hard drive at all (a light appears for 10 seconds then nothing). The first hard drive is doing the same thing as it always was (blue screen). So now I have two hard drives that are messed up and I have no clue to why they are. Also, when I go into DOS via boot up disk it says that C: doesn't exist.

First Hard Drive: Windows 2000 Pro, gives boot device inaccessible blue screen. Hardware is ATA/66, IBM Deskstar hard drive.

Second Hard: Windows 98, gives me "Ultra66 BIOS not installed" then "No Operating System Found". Hardware is ATA/66, Quantum Fireball Plus hard drive.

Please, if ANYONE can help me find a solution I will be eternally grateful.

If you need more info, please don't hesitate to ask.

 

[KGB]

Have you cleared the CMOS on either system?

Can you feel the IBM drive spool-up on power up?
What happens when you boot from a Win98 floppy?

 

[MichaelB5]

The drive on the second computer is pretty much dead so I am focusing on the first computer now. I took the battery out of it for about 12 hours and that didn't help at all. I can feel the drive working and I can hear the disks spinning. When I boot from the Win 98 boot disk it gives me access to DOS but I can only access the A: drive and the CD drives, I can't access C:.

I was about to post a new message concerning just my computer (the first computer) but I'll just post is here:

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I am having a problem with my hard drive. My computer is running Windows 2000 Professional and whenever I start my computer I get the blue screen stop error INACCESSIBLE_BOOT_DEVICE.

Here are some specifications for my computer/hardware:

- The hard drive is an IBM Deskstar and has a capacity of 27.3 GB

- The hard drive controller is ATA/66

- The computer is a Dell Dimension 600mhz, 512 MB RAM

- Computer is running Windows 2000 Professional

I have tried taking everything out and put them back in, using a different ATA/66 hard drive controller card, taking the battery out, resetting the BIOS, reinstalling the BIOS, checking for viruses with a McAfee boot scan disk, and a lot of other things. I can get into DOS using a Windows 98 boot up disk but I can?t view the C drive from there. I can?t run the Windows 2000 setup from the CD because it can?t run in DOS.

I don?t think a bad connection is the problem. When I start up my computer is lists the IDE slots and has my hard drive in slot 0, which is right. When I run FDISK it has my partition there.

The hard drive works, it?s just that I can?t access it. I think Windows 2000 has done something to mess it all up, but I?m not sure. I need to get the data off there but I don?t know how.

Right now, any information about my problem would be helpful. I have tried everything that I can think of and nothing works. I have called Dell and their tech support is too incompetent to understand anything so they just hang up on me.

 

[MichaelB5]

Ok, I ran the Windows 2000 Setup and chose Repair. I did the emergency repair because when I tried the console it asked for the "Administrator" password and I put it what I thought was it but it didn't accept it (I use my name as the login for Window 2000). Anyway, it did some "examining" and rebooted. I usually get the INACCESSIBLE_BOOT_DEVICE blue screen at the black Windows 2000 loading screen, but this time it got to the white one before it got the blue screen. Maybe Windows 2000 is the problem. Is there anything else I can do further to fix it or can I install a new copy over the old one to retrieve my data?

Any help would be appreciated.

 

[MichaelB5]

I installed a new copy of Windows 2000 and it works. I found my files so everything is good.