5 hard drives in XP Pro

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Guest

I recently added 2 hard drives to my system and took an old one out. I have
a total of 5 hard drives (hdds). 4 of which go to an IDE/RAID controller and
1 to the mobo. The C drive is partioned to 2 logical drives, the rest are
single partitions. All are formatted NTFS.

When i installed the new hdds i had only the C drive (with windows) and the
2 new ones attached. I formatted and partioned them just fine and shut down.
I plugged in the drive i was getting rid of and copied the files to the 2
new drives without any problems. I then plugged all my drives back in and
got them all to show up on POST. But when windows starts, only one of the
new drives will show up.

I've swapped out the IDE cable, and tried different molex connections
thinking i didn't have enough power (which i do), but that didn't work. I
then decided to try just the 2 new hdds to see if they would work without the
other hdds. No go. Only one would show up no matter how i had them
connected, PM and PS, PM and SM, or any combination. Individually, with only
one of the new ones (doesn't matter which one) they work fine and show up
healthy in computer management and all my files are accessible. With both
plugged in, one will say failed but gives me the option to partition it again.

Anyone have an idea of why my 2 new hdds won't play nice with each other
anymore?
 
brian said:
I recently added 2 hard drives to my system and took an old one out. I have
a total of 5 hard drives (hdds). 4 of which go to an IDE/RAID controller and
1 to the mobo. The C drive is partioned to 2 logical drives, the rest are
single partitions. All are formatted NTFS.

When i installed the new hdds i had only the C drive (with windows) and the
2 new ones attached. I formatted and partioned them just fine and shut down.
I plugged in the drive i was getting rid of and copied the files to the 2
new drives without any problems. I then plugged all my drives back in and
got them all to show up on POST. But when windows starts, only one of the
new drives will show up.

I've swapped out the IDE cable, and tried different molex connections
thinking i didn't have enough power (which i do), but that didn't work. I
then decided to try just the 2 new hdds to see if they would work without the
other hdds. No go. Only one would show up no matter how i had them
connected, PM and PS, PM and SM, or any combination. Individually, with only
one of the new ones (doesn't matter which one) they work fine and show up
healthy in computer management and all my files are accessible. With both
plugged in, one will say failed but gives me the option to partition it again.

Anyone have an idea of why my 2 new hdds won't play nice with each other
anymore?
Click to expand...

You didn't mention the drive's jumpers, though it sounds like you know what
you're doing. Here's a WAG. XP assigns drive letters to be "sticky". Perhaps
there's a conflict with more than one volume requiring the same letter.
Try temporarily reassigning the partition(s) on the "visible" volume a good
deal furthur up the alphabet. Reboot.
 
The drives were labled when i formated and partitioned them. C drive is
partitioned to C and V. The 2 new drives are T and U. The older drives are W
and X. Before, i had X, Y, Z and C with V with no problems. I didn't check
the jumpers before i mounted the hdds into the case, but when i had them
hooked up and laying outside the case, they were PM and PS or SM and SS and
didn't give me any problems. Other than a jumper mysteriously changing
(maybe a nephew got ahold of it, but i kind of doubt it), can there be
something in windows i'm missing?
 
No good ideas really..
Are the devices all listed correctly in Device Manager? You said, you were given
an option to partition/format again? Can you do that without data loss?
 
brian said:
I recently added 2 hard drives to my system and took an old one out. I
have
a total of 5 hard drives (hdds). 4 of which go to an IDE/RAID controller
and
1 to the mobo. The C drive is partioned to 2 logical drives, the rest are
single partitions. All are formatted NTFS.
Click to expand...

Disinformation from the get-go. How can you partition a boot drive (C),
into 2 logical drives and expect it to boot?

What are "single partitions", as opposed to primary/extended/logical
partitions?

Not wading through any more of this post as many assumptions are required on
my part.
 
by saying the c drive was partitioned, i was implying the physical drive was
partitioned to two logical partitions. I simply used C as a reference.
A single partition would be the entire drive being used as one partition.
So C would be the primary with V being extended. The rest of the physical
hdds have only one partition, call them what you may.

I think it made sense. It would be a stretch saying the main physical hdd
with the OS on it being partioned to 2, but i could see where it might be a
little confusing. I think for the most part, you were just nitpicking.
 
C: is denoted a partition letter, otherwise known as "drive" letter in MS
language. A hard drive is a hard drive, not a partition designation. A
hard drive has a number designation from the bios such as "0" or "1" for
instance.

If you got something to provide, do so in a fashion that's normally used so
most can understand it from the get-go.

No, not a nit-pick. Tired of people asking opinions, suggestions, and so
forth based on flimsy information. No one can form an opinion or suggestion
based on loose language that can mean alot of things, no just one thing.

And I'm tired of many people providing opinions or suggestions, and only the
rare few who interpret that information correctly get to participate.
Unless of course its a troll post expecting just that, multiple
interpretations to create a thread of multiple directions having nothing to
do with the original intentions if it was bonafide.
 
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