Windows will not fully load with WD SATA harddrive plugged in

[csn1e08]

I'm having an odd problem here with a WD 500GB harddrive that I have had for maybe 6 months now. I believe it started right when I switched over to a new motherboard and processor although I've just ignored the problem for a while so I may be mistaken.

Any time this harddrive is plugged in, Windows will get to "Starting up Windows..." right before the login but never get to the login. If it is not plugged in I barely even see the "Starting up Windows..." message it goes by so fast. This freeze-up happens with all of my (5) HD's and two DVD burners hooked up but ALSO happens when only the WD and the 80GB IDE drive with Windows on it and nothing else (so I presume it is not a lack of power issue). Any ideas? Could my new mobo just not like this drive randomly? I've tried it with both Molex and SATA power. I've also tried hot swapping it in with the OS running and it froze everything (may be that the mobo needs further setup to allow hot swapping, I've never tried it before). I can hear the harddrive spin up and it doesn't sound weird at all. Also, I have used different cables for both data and power and different plug-in points on the mobo.

HDDs:
80GB IDE (Windows)
80GB SATA Hitachi
250GB SATA Hitachi
320GB SATA Hitachi
500GB SATA Western Digital - non-working

Proc: Core2Duo E8400 3.0GHz
Mobo: Gigabyte EP35-DS3R
OS: Windows XP Pro SP3 (issue started when it was still SP2)

Any ideas would be greatly appreciated, especially as I have a rather large amount of stuff on that drive that I would like to recover, not the least of which is my resume and business contact stuff.

Thanks,
Chris

 

[taltamir]

firstly, in the future i suggest you back up your data, drives fail, that is a fact.

As for your problem, are you sure the drive did not break while you were handling the mobo upgrade? windows freezing is the behaviour i see with broken drives.
try it in another computer if you can, or an external enclosure, you can get a cheap one for about 20$ and plug the drive to the PC externally via usb, that way if there is a mobo incompatibility you would work around it (i have seen it, but usually on lesser boards, not a quality one like the gigabyte EP35-DS3R).

Actually I have that EXACT same mobo and it works fine with my multiple western digital caviar SE16 500GB AAKS... and I broke one of them during an install before.