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Solve : How to boot XP from a SATA disk with an IDE adapter?? |
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Answer» I have XP SP3 and my system disk was giving trouble, so I cloned it to a new disk (using Casper) and REPLACED the old disk with the new one. The computer only has IDE, not SATA; but I didn't anticipate a problem when I bought a SATA disk with an IDE adapter as the new disk — it was advertised as just the thing for replacing a faulty IDE disk in an oldish machine. But the machine won't boot from the new disk; with only that disk available, it won't boot at all. When booted from another medium, the new disk is perfectly usable. But I need to be able to boot from it. Is there a way to do this? Thanks for any ideas. (I've always found clones made with Casper to be bootable; I've made clones to IDE disks before and booted from them. The difference this time is that it's a SATA disk in an IDE adapter.)Did they tell you the adapter was compatible at the BIOS level? What actually happens is strange. With only this new disk attached, Windows begins to load, but on reaching the point when you would expect the invite to login, no such invite appears but the process stops and the machine has to be switched off. Based on the fact that the OS loads, but does not fully initialize, I'd say that it did not properly "ghost" the original disk. Since your computer will begin the boot sequence from that HDD, then it doesn't seem like an issue with detecting the drive (though there could be some issue like that since it is an older machine), but rather that the OS is broken. Personally I've never used Casper for ghosting, just Paragon. However there are some good tools included for free in Hiren's BCD which you could try. Try ghosting the original disk using another software such as the above listed. You could also try running a repair via the XP disk, but that also may not solve the problem... OH! And did you try booting to safe-mode? There's my $0.02! - kyle_engineerThis is just an interim update. Those of you who suspected that the cloning wasn't 100% successful may be proved right. The people at Casper are looking into it at present anyway. On a couple of other points raised: • my old IDE system disk was 250GB, so it's not the "LBA thing" • trying to boot in safe mode hangs in the same way • the vendor of the IDE adapter suggested the XP repair disk too, but I can't verify this as I never had such a disk, or an XP CD either • a new motherboard would be too complicated for me, plus it wouldn't outlive the machine Thanks again, all responses are appreciated.Well, I repeated the cloning operation, and this time it worked! That is, the target disk is bootable. There were differences in the circumstances, however. In the first attempt to clone, when the target disk was left unbootable, the target disk had been completely unused prior to the cloning operation. This would be a common enough circumstance. In the second attempt, the target disk was already formatted and contained data, as a result of the first attempt. Also, in the first attempt, the source disk was primary master, and the target disk, via the SATA-to-IDE adapter, was in the secondary IDE slot. In the second attempt, the source disk was secondary master, and the target disk, via the SATA-to-IDE adapter, was in the primary IDE slot. Both times, of course, the source disk was functioning as system disk. I don't feel this difference was significant. Both attempts had in common that the target disk was attached via the SATA-to-IDE adapter. In this, they differed from all my previous uses of Casper, which used IDE disks as both source and target. Casper actually gave a warning, during the first attempt, that it "could not write to backup boot record" on the target disk, but this message was hidden in the (HTML) report of the operation, and only visible on examining the source of the report. The Casper people also pointed out to me a number of errors in the machine's system log, but I am unconvinced that these had any bearing on the failure of the program to write the boot record first time. Since the same combination of circumstances is unlikely to arise again, I suppose we will never know for sure whether the problem would recur, or whether it was a one-off. At all events, everything is WORKING now, and it has been proven that using a disk through a SATA-to-IDE adapter does not prevent that disk from functioning as the system disk. giomach, thank your for sharing this. Glad to hear that you got it to work. So, one might reason, the solution is 'Try, try again.' The Casper the OP referees to is a product of Future Systems Solutions. They coffer a free version of the disk clone software. http://www.fssdev.com/products/casper/trial/ PS. It is not uncommon for a drive clone to fail the first time.It was never the adapter...it was the cloning app and restore process... Very common with any imaging app unfortunately. Quote from: patio on February 26, 2014, 03:54:28 PM It was never the adapter...it was the cloning app and restore process...You are right, Patio It might be said this could happen with other clone software. It does...with all of them. Quote from: patio on February 26, 2014, 03:54:28 PM It was never the adapter...it was the cloning app and restore process... Even Macrium Reflect? Quote from: artbuc on February 28, 2014, 02:06:08 AM Even Macrium Reflect?It has more to do with the HDD condition. The OP said it worked the second time. Some place it has been documented that the HDD firmware can "cure" a HDD problem with another write operation is performed. The OS has no control over this. The algorithm is proprietary. It extend the life a the HDD by a large factor. It often is never noticed. |
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