Win7 C drive won't boot, unless 2nd drive is present :(

griffy · 16 Dec 2010 at 17:32

Help!!!!

I have 2x hard drives in my system, and another bigger faster one I wish to install and make the main system disk.

I want to clone the windows 7 drive onto the new 500gb drive, but I have a problem!!

If the C: and D: hard drives are both installed. The system boots up fine into Windows 7 (the D drive used to have vista on it)

If the C: drive is installed on its own, the system refuses to boot, giving me an error. Looks like my Bootmanger is on the D drive? Can I move it?

I don't want to reinstall everything all over again onto the new 3rd drive, I want to clone a bootable C onto it, then remove C and D entirely from my system

mikeo · 16 Dec 2010 at 17:35

Think the following will work. Disconnect your secondary drive. Insert your Windows disk and do a repair, pretty sure it will re-build your boot drives MBR.

PS. When installing Windows in the future. Only have the drive that you want to put your OS on connected and let Windows handle your partitions.

griffy · 16 Dec 2010 at 17:44

Trying it now (using the Mac right now

)

Thanks, hope it works!

griffy · 16 Dec 2010 at 18:23

Not working, the repair console thingy doesn't list an operating system.

griffy · 16 Dec 2010 at 18:39

Fixed it!

Many thanks

mikeo · 16 Dec 2010 at 18:44

Looks like there may be a bit more to it.

Clear guide at:

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/20864-mbr-restore-windows-7-master-boot-record.html

mikeo · 16 Dec 2010 at 18:45

griffy said:
Fixed it!

Many thanks

Good show...

Hodders · 17 Dec 2010 at 10:20

Do you want to say what you did as people searching for the same issue can then find an answer !

Glad you got it sorted though.

wolvers · 17 Dec 2010 at 10:21

Does part of the MBR get put on the other drive, during installation of windows, then?

rpstewart · 17 Dec 2010 at 10:36

wolvers69 said:
Does part of the MBR get put on the other drive, during installation of windows, then?

The MBR will be placed on the drive which Windows enumerates as disk0 regardless of which drive you actually choose to install Windows on. Therefore if you have 2 drives installed, one in SATA port 0 and one in SATA port 1 the MBR will end up on the drive in SATA port 0.

The simple rule of thumb is never to install Windows with more than one HDD connected to the system.

mikeo · 17 Dec 2010 at 12:22

rpstewart said:
The simple rule of thumb is never to install Windows with more than one HDD connected to the system.

Indeed.

Moron · 9 Jan 2011 at 11:09

griffy said:
Not working, the repair console thingy doesn't list an operating system.

Sorry to open an odl thread but having same issue of when I boot with just the second HD installed it doesn't give me the option of repairing an operating system.