Disk number change

  • Thread starter Thread starter Guest
  • Start date Start date
G

Guest

Quick version: Windows has reversed the numbering of my three disk drives
(which have six partitions between them) so that it doesn't want to boot from
my 80GB disk with the C: drive partition. Obviously, the boot loader is
unhappy, but I can't find any info on how to change the drive numbers.
Additionally, two partitions on a second drive are hidden.

Long, drawn-out version: I tried installing Ubuntu Linux on a drive by
itself, and while the install went OK the boot loader got screwed up. I tried
both fixmbr and Norton's Boot Magic (I don't like the latter much, but I was
desperate). I got GRUB off as the boot loader, but now the computer won't
boot without me using the BIOS's boot menu to specifically select the drive
with the system partition on it. Disk Manager and Partition Manager both
report the drives in the inverse of the order they were in: Disk 1 is my big
drive with Windows swap and temp space, documents, and programs; Disk 2 is
the Linux file system and swap dirve; Disk 3 is the Windows system drive. No
cables were touched, let alone harmed, in this travesty. This followed by a
week the death of one of my motherboard memory slots, so I'm a little worried
about it. The MB still reports the disks on the correct SATA channels, so I'm
uber-stumped.
 
Pierce Presley said:
Quick version: Windows has reversed the numbering of my three disk drives
(which have six partitions between them) so that it doesn't want to boot from
my 80GB disk with the C: drive partition. Obviously, the boot loader is
unhappy, but I can't find any info on how to change the drive numbers.
Additionally, two partitions on a second drive are hidden.

Long, drawn-out version: I tried installing Ubuntu Linux on a drive by
itself, and while the install went OK the boot loader got screwed up. I tried
both fixmbr and Norton's Boot Magic (I don't like the latter much, but I was
desperate). I got GRUB off as the boot loader, but now the computer won't
boot without me using the BIOS's boot menu to specifically select the drive
with the system partition on it. Disk Manager and Partition Manager both
report the drives in the inverse of the order they were in: Disk 1 is my big
drive with Windows swap and temp space, documents, and programs; Disk 2 is
the Linux file system and swap dirve; Disk 3 is the Windows system drive. No
cables were touched, let alone harmed, in this travesty. This followed by a
week the death of one of my motherboard memory slots, so I'm a little worried
about it. The MB still reports the disks on the correct SATA channels, so I'm
uber-stumped.
Click to expand...

It's not too difficult to fix this problem but the actual method depends
on what you currently have.
a) How far does the boot process go?
b) What messages do you see on the screen?
c) Is the machine networked?
d) Do you have another WinXP/2000 PC available?
 
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