Windows Boots but No Primary Partition!

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Guest

Nearly every time I reboot our Windows 2000 Server, the system drive is
coming up as drive I instead of C. It then shows both drive I and C in the
Logical Drives and most things still work OK. (Only about one in four
reboots will it select drive C as the correct drive.) I've managed to reboot
this time with drive C, but this is still a problem for next time I need to
reboot the server.

The worrying thing is in Disk Management, Windows is showing my Primary
Partition as drive H which is an Iomega REV backup drive. I tried unplugging
and uninstalling the REV drive, but then Windows just boots with no primary
partition at all!

I tried amending the boot sequence with no difference. I tried changing the
registry key, HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE, SYSTEM, MountedDevices. There was a key
which said \DosDevices\I: I renamed this to \DosDevices\C: and rebooted, but
it just keeps going back to I. Then on the odd occasion it will actually
boot as drive C.

Just to explain - This partition is on Disk0 which is Dynamic, Online and
has three other partitions, all 4 showing as Simple Volumes.

However Disk0 is actually two physical disks, both 36GB, with RAID (don't
really know much about this). I did check the Adaptec settings but I don't
think anything's changed there.

Only obvious thing we did recently was attempt to install new memory, but it
was the wrong type. We installed NON ECC Registered when we should have had
ECC Registered. The server just didn't boot at all so we took it straight
out again. I can only assume this drive problem has happened since then.

PLEASE can someone help?

Thanks very much
Sharon
 
shabby said:
Nearly every time I reboot our Windows 2000 Server, the system drive is
coming up as drive I instead of C. It then shows both drive I and C in the
Logical Drives and most things still work OK. (Only about one in four
reboots will it select drive C as the correct drive.) I've managed to reboot
this time with drive C, but this is still a problem for next time I need to
reboot the server.

The worrying thing is in Disk Management, Windows is showing my Primary
Partition as drive H which is an Iomega REV backup drive. I tried unplugging
and uninstalling the REV drive, but then Windows just boots with no primary
partition at all!

I tried amending the boot sequence with no difference. I tried changing the
registry key, HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE, SYSTEM, MountedDevices. There was a key
which said \DosDevices\I: I renamed this to \DosDevices\C: and rebooted, but
it just keeps going back to I. Then on the odd occasion it will actually
boot as drive C.

Just to explain - This partition is on Disk0 which is Dynamic, Online and
has three other partitions, all 4 showing as Simple Volumes.

However Disk0 is actually two physical disks, both 36GB, with RAID (don't
really know much about this). I did check the Adaptec settings but I don't
think anything's changed there.

Only obvious thing we did recently was attempt to install new memory, but it
was the wrong type. We installed NON ECC Registered when we should have had
ECC Registered. The server just didn't boot at all so we took it straight
out again. I can only assume this drive problem has happened since then.
Click to expand...

I assume that by "primary partition", you really mean "system
partition".

Take a look at the contents of Boot.ini. I've seen similar weird
behavior when the boot partition in this file was changed (although it
wasn't inconsistent).
 
No, I do actually mean Primary Partition.

Windows is still recognising it as my system partition and booting up, but
the weird thing is within Disk Management, I have No Primary Partition unless
the REV drive is attached and it detects that as a Primary Partition (as in
the colour coding at the bottom of the screen - it's dark blue).

I checked Boot.ini and nothing's changed there.
 
Just ignore the Partition bit about this post! I have just learnt that you
don't get a Primary Partition on Dynamic Disks!

It's only since we've had the problem with the system booting up as drive
"I" instead of "C" that I noticed there is no Primary Partition and panicked
- but this is apparently normal!

Anyway, we've still got the problem with Windows naming our system drive as
"I" instead of "C", but occasionaly it will boot correctly (about one in
five).

Anyone help?
 
Did you install the rollup? Seems duplicate mounting of the %systemdrive%
can be a side effect.

Rollup 1 for Microsoft Windows 2000 Service Pack 4
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/891861

--
Regards,

Dave Patrick ....Please no email replies - reply in newsgroup.
Microsoft Certified Professional
Microsoft MVP [Windows]
http://www.microsoft.com/protect

:
| Just ignore the Partition bit about this post! I have just learnt that
you
| don't get a Primary Partition on Dynamic Disks!
|
| It's only since we've had the problem with the system booting up as drive
| "I" instead of "C" that I noticed there is no Primary Partition and
panicked
| - but this is apparently normal!
|
| Anyway, we've still got the problem with Windows naming our system drive
as
| "I" instead of "C", but occasionaly it will boot correctly (about one in
| five).
|
| Anyone help?
|
 
Wow - thanks so much!

Yes, unfortunately Rollup 1 is part of the Automatic Updates so it is
installed, and we do have dynamic disks so it sounds exactly like my problem!
I will follow the procedure for uninstalling the rollup and hopefully all
will be well.

I wonder if Microsoft will refund the £69 that I just paid for a support
incident online!

Thanks again.
 
I would think so if you mention that article ID.

--
Regards,

Dave Patrick ....Please no email replies - reply in newsgroup.
Microsoft Certified Professional
Microsoft MVP [Windows]
http://www.microsoft.com/protect

:
| Wow - thanks so much!
|
| Yes, unfortunately Rollup 1 is part of the Automatic Updates so it is
| installed, and we do have dynamic disks so it sounds exactly like my
problem!
| I will follow the procedure for uninstalling the rollup and hopefully all
| will be well.
|
| I wonder if Microsoft will refund the £69 that I just paid for a support
| incident online!
|
| Thanks again.
 
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