Master Boot Record or....

Charlie Bravo · 22 Oct 2010 at 07:43

A friends laptop refuses to boot and is on a blue screen cycle displaying 'unbootable boot volume'. I have removed the drive and installed it into an external caddy but my laptop refuses to read it.

If for instance the MBR was corrupt, would it stop the drive from being read full stop or is it just dead?

Thanks all...

lurkio · 22 Oct 2010 at 09:02

Iam pretty sure mbr being corrupted would only stop it booting , not it showing up at all

When you right click my computer -> manage ->disk mangament
does it show there and if so does it have a drive letter

Stick you ear to the caddy to ensure the drive is actually spinning up
sometimes a single usb cant spin up the drive due to not being able to deliver enough current.

rpstewart · 22 Oct 2010 at 09:22

If the MBR is corrupt then the partition table is also corrupt so the OS can't tell how the disk is laid out.

You could try booting from a Windows CD and running fixmbr on it.

Charlie Bravo · 22 Oct 2010 at 09:25

Thanks chaps. The caddy I'm using has 2 USB power leads so it is providing enough for the drive to function. It spins up but does little else.
As for the drive management, it won't even show in there. In fact it locks my laptop until I unplug it.

Tried hunting for my Windows CD last night but I haven't got a clue where it is. Seems that the drive has had its day.