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The other day, I switched on a computer with three hard drives, each with its own Windows XP. Drive #0 has for first partition C:, on which the main Windows is installed. It got as far as as the boot manager but Windows would not boot up, several times. I thought connection problem so I opened it up and checked every plug and socket. All seemed OK. Windows would still not boot up.
I then tried one of the other drives. This time, Windows started to boot but baulked half-way through. Same with the third one which housed what I have on the main one, as a backup, dated about 3 months ago. I then tried a repair installation of Win on the last one. It worked except that several drivers were not acknowledged. I installed them and it started limping along ± correctly. In a moment of aberration, I saw that Win was on the C: drive and thought this was the main one I tried to access originally, until I saw there were things that I knew were not installed there. I then realised what had happened: Drive 0 had failed. I went into system administration and saw indeed that there were Drives 0 and 1, but the partition letters were haywire, but there should have been Drives 0, 1 and 2. Going back to the hardware, I found two drives were hot and the third one was only warm.
I checked the SATA cable at both ends. I then checked the power cable by swapping it over from the second drive. Lo and behold! A perfect boot up. As I was plugging in the power cable from the first to the second drive, I noticed it went in at a slight angle, so I switched off and pulled the plug and looked at it under a magnifier:
It showed there was a tiny crack at the LH end in this photo. This allowed the top surface of the plug to lift slightly, just sufficient to have a poor contact at that end. I changed the plug and everything then worked normally. What I found aberrant and misled me was that Win changed the drive letters: this threw me until I realised what had happened.
I find the SATA plugs/sockets to be flimsier than in IDE (PATA) drives and consequently less reliable. I wasted a lot of time before I found that tiny crack, hardly visible to the naked eye.
I then tried one of the other drives. This time, Windows started to boot but baulked half-way through. Same with the third one which housed what I have on the main one, as a backup, dated about 3 months ago. I then tried a repair installation of Win on the last one. It worked except that several drivers were not acknowledged. I installed them and it started limping along ± correctly. In a moment of aberration, I saw that Win was on the C: drive and thought this was the main one I tried to access originally, until I saw there were things that I knew were not installed there. I then realised what had happened: Drive 0 had failed. I went into system administration and saw indeed that there were Drives 0 and 1, but the partition letters were haywire, but there should have been Drives 0, 1 and 2. Going back to the hardware, I found two drives were hot and the third one was only warm.
I checked the SATA cable at both ends. I then checked the power cable by swapping it over from the second drive. Lo and behold! A perfect boot up. As I was plugging in the power cable from the first to the second drive, I noticed it went in at a slight angle, so I switched off and pulled the plug and looked at it under a magnifier:
It showed there was a tiny crack at the LH end in this photo. This allowed the top surface of the plug to lift slightly, just sufficient to have a poor contact at that end. I changed the plug and everything then worked normally. What I found aberrant and misled me was that Win changed the drive letters: this threw me until I realised what had happened.
I find the SATA plugs/sockets to be flimsier than in IDE (PATA) drives and consequently less reliable. I wasted a lot of time before I found that tiny crack, hardly visible to the naked eye.
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