Hard Drive Showing as Removable After Installing Win7

Gall1987 · 3 Dec 2009 at 18:39

Hi

I've recently upgraded to Win7 from Vista. I did it as a clean install. However it now looks as though my main C: drive is showing as a removable device.

Can anybody help with this?

Werewolf · 3 Dec 2009 at 18:56

If it's SATA it could be down to one of the settings.
From memory SATA has "removable" drives as part of the spec (ESATA is basically just a different connector), so if the controller supports hot swap it'll show as a removable drive, even if it's an internal one.

I think there is a way to hide that option for specified drives in windows though

(I've got all 4 of my SATA drives showing as removable).

Gall1987 · 3 Dec 2009 at 19:02

Werewolf said:
If it's SATA it could be down to one of the settings.
From memory SATA has "removable" drives as part of the spec (ESATA is basically just a different connector), so if the controller supports hot swap it'll show as a removable drive, even if it's an internal one.

I think there is a way to hide that option for specified drives in windows though (I've got all 4 of my SATA drives showing as removable).

You'll have to be gentle, I'm not that technically minded!

How do I found out if it's a 'SATA' drive? When I was using Vista the drive didn't show as removable and it has only been happening since I upgraded to W7.

Sp00n · 3 Dec 2009 at 19:16

Open the case, if the cable looks like this:

then its IDE.

If it looks like this:

Then its sata.

Gall1987 · 3 Dec 2009 at 19:21

Sp00n said:
Open the case, if the cable looks like this:

then its IDE.

If it looks like this:

Then its sata.

It's a SATA (I think!). Is there any way that I can stop this showing then as it was previously when running Vista? Or is it just a case of ignoring it?

Cheers for your help