Don't try this at home? - Swapping HDDs from a T40 to T42

Message

baertracks · #1 Post by **baertracks** » Thu Mar 17, 2005 12:47 am

I just received a T42 (2373Yd2) with 40GB hard drive. My "old" computer is a T40 (2372AU1) with 80GB HDD. I also purchased an ultrabay slim HDD adapter in order to make it "easy" to access my current files on the new computer from the old drive.

Frist, I removed the 80GB HDD from the T40 and inserted it into the caddy and then into the ultrabay. After I rebooted, I could read that drive fine (but couldn't run my email program from it).

Second, I tried rebooting from the 80GB HDD with it still in the ultrabay. I got the to the log on screen OK, but after clicking to log on the computer immediately logged off and powered down.

Third, I tried putting the 80GB HDD physically in the primary drive of the T42 without having anything in the ultrabay. Same results as above.

Fourth, I put the 80GB HDD drive back into the primary drive of the T40 (original configuration), but am still having a problem. This time, after "loggin in" the screen flashes to say that it is "loading personal preferences" and then immediately logs off and returns to the login prompt screen.

Fifth, before I try anything else (and perhaps make things worse), I thought I had better asked for some advice from this forum.

What happened and what do I do to correct the problem?

Thanks for your assistance.

FRANK
Baertracks

#2 Post by **JaneL** » Thu Mar 17, 2005 1:01 am

What OS are you running? If it's XP and you have the CD, try doing a repair install. Report back.

baertracks · #3 Post by **baertracks** » Thu Mar 17, 2005 1:11 am

I am running Windows XP. Not sure if I have the CD for this laptop. I'll check around.

By the way, I am trying to logon as administrator without a password (which is the way I have always loggin one.) I just tried a SAFE boot, and get the same problem.

Thanks for the suggestion.

FRANK

baertracks · #4 Post by **baertracks** » Thu Mar 17, 2005 1:39 am

I found a Windows XP CD. When booting from the CD drive it loads a bunch of drivers and also gives me a brief option to do an Automatic System Recovery (which I assume is NOT what I want).

I end up at a screen where I can select "To repair a Windows XP installation using Recovery Counsel press R" (which is, I assume, the option that I want).

Clicking "R" prompts me to select the Windows location to log onto. Doing that then asks me for the Administator password, and then takes me to the C:\Windows\ prompt.

Now what? I do not see anything in the HELP menu which looks like a "Repair" command. Am I missing something?

Regards,
FRANK

#5 Post by **BillMorrow** » Thu Mar 17, 2005 2:03 am

sounds like windows is biting you in the [censored]..

the hardware is different but not THAT different..
only thing i can suggest is reloading XP or running the recovery while the 80gig is in the T42..

but first, try to save your important data and let me ask what is on the 40gig..?

baertracks · #6 Post by **baertracks** » Thu Mar 17, 2005 2:25 am

[quote="only thing i can suggest is reloading XP or running the recovery while the 80gig is in the T42..[/quote]

That's an idea, but I don't have a Windows CD for the T42. There is nothing on the 40GB expect the standard WinXP that comes with a T42 (with fingerprint).

Thanks for the suggestion.

FRANK

#7 Post by **BillMorrow** » Thu Mar 17, 2005 3:04 am

can you run the recovery..?
i.e. if you have nothing on the HDD you want to save, can you run the recovery from the recovery partition..?

the recovery process will configure itself to the hardware it sees..
generally..
across T42 models..
not sure how the T42 recovery will work on a T41 and probably won't work on a T40..

Marc_G · #8 Post by **Marc_G** » Thu Mar 17, 2005 9:58 am

Hi Baertracks-

I've been where you are. Here's the trouble:

NTFS remembers drive letter assignments, unlike FAT or FAT32. So, when you plunked the 80 GB drive into the ultrabay on your new computer, it's drive letter changed from C: to some other letter (D:, E: whatever) so that it could be accessed by the new system, since there was already a C: drive present.

When you took the drive out of the caddy, it STILL thought it was D: or E: or whatever.

When you booted from it in your old computer, the primary boot process doesn't care about drive letters, just which partition on which disk on which channel, so you get to the login screen. But then when you get past the initial logon, suddenly it expected everything to be on C: and it wasn't. Bummer.

Try this. Put the 80 GB drive back in the ultrabay of your already-booted new computer. It will show up as D: or E: or whatever.

Go into Admin Tools... Computer Management... Storage... Disk management. You will see this disk in there as Disk 1. Right click on the D: (or whatever) volume and choose to Change Drive Letter. Choose the "Remove" option. This removes the drive letter. It will go away in My Computer.

Remove the ultrabay drive (safely... use the "Safely Remove Hardware tool ).

Put it into your old computer. Boot. If you are religious, pray. If not, consider the grand scheme of the universe and how you fit in it. This will be one of the longer boots of your life.

If you have lead a good life, the drive will automatically get re-assigned a drive letter using the first available letter, C:, and you should be back to normal.

I went through this recently; there are some posts around here about it.

Let us know how it goes!!
Marc

baertracks · #9 Post by **baertracks** » Thu Mar 17, 2005 12:01 pm

Marc;

Thanks for the advice. I thought that it might be something like this.

However, I must not be leading a "good life". I followed your instructions exactly, but still got the same result when I rebooted the drive in my T40. The only difference was that after clicking to "log in", the screen goes to a "Logging off" message and just stays there (before it went back to the log in screen).

I will give it another try. Meanwhile, are there any other suggetions?

Regards,
FRANK
Baertracks

Marc_G · #10 Post by **Marc_G** » Thu Mar 17, 2005 12:50 pm

Frank-

Bummer!

In some cases, the location of the page file gets messed up as part of this drive mapping thing. I had one similar situation where after having this problem, the system insisted on creating a page file on the D: drive, and when there was no D: drive present, it gave the log on / log off symptom. Of course I didn't know this was the problem at the time.

On advice from someone else, I put some old HD I had laying around into the into the Ultrabay to serve as the D: drive, then rebooted. This time the system logged me on without logging me off, and I was able to go in and adjust my virtual memory to use just C:. This cured the problem.

The hard part about this situation is finding decent keywords to google with.

You don't have an image backup to restore from by any chance, do you?

Marc

Marc_G · #11 Post by **Marc_G** » Thu Mar 17, 2005 12:57 pm

PS: If it is indeed the pagefile thing causing the problem at this point, an external USB drive that would mount as D: (or whatever) would do the trick just as well as an Ultrabay drive.

It sounds like you might do well to invest in one. I have two 2.5" USB USB drives that are nice in that they can be powered from the laptop, but 3.5" drives will be cheaper for larger storage.

http://www.compusa.com/products/product ... pfp=SEARCH

Keep us posted. This is fixable, once the specific cause is found.

Marc_G · #12 Post by **Marc_G** » Thu Mar 17, 2005 1:53 pm

One more thing that came to me during lunch:

The first time I ever encountered this, it happened when I was cloning a drive from primary to the ultrabay (in DOS, driven by a program on a floppy). Afterward, I accidentally left the second drive in the ultrabay, and booted to Windows (Win 2000), and the problem came up NEXT TIME I BOOTED WITHOUT THE SECOND DRIVE IN THE BAY. It booted fine when the clone was in the second drive bay.

At the time, I didn't know how to deal with this, and I eventually cloned the drive BACK from the ultrabay to the primary, since the Ultrabay clone was made PRIOR to the problem.

Much later, an IT person I trust told me that there was a known bug where the master boot record on the primary drive can get corrupted during the boot process when there is a clone in the secondary bay. Apparently the fix was to run FIXMBR and possibly FIXBOOT from the XP Repair environment. I've never fixed anything this way but kept the knowledge for the future.

So, if all else fails, you might try using FixBoot and FixMBR. Neither of these should be destructive to your drive, unless you've got something like an unusual multi-boot situation going on.

Best of luck; please keep us posted.

Marc

Leon · #13 Post by **Leon** » Thu Mar 17, 2005 2:33 pm

Wow, you know your Disks!
(can't wait till you have dinner

)

baertracks · #14 Post by **baertracks** » Thu Mar 17, 2005 3:02 pm

Thanks Marc. I really appreciate all the advice. Here's my current situational.

First, I tried rebooting with a USB HDD connected. No luck

Second, I rebooted with a second HDD in the ultrabay. The system went past the login screen and started to load my screen settings (and things started looking up!). The screen settings almost loaded when I received a generic "Windows Installation" message. The display eventually reverted to the shut down/reboot mode, and took me back (once again) to the login screen. Rats.

Third, I rebooted using SAFE mode, and finally arrived at the windows screen where I can do something. I have determined that the ultabay HDD is being read as the "C" primary (Disk 1) drive with a healthy (Page File) status. The 80GB "internal" drive is being read as the "D" drive (Disk 0) with a Healthy (System) status. There is also a 5GB IBM service partition that is Healthy (Unknown Partition). At least everyone is healthy!

Needless to say, I am a bit paranoid as what to do next. My inclination would be to:
1) Remove the "C" drive within Admin Tools
2) Rename "D" to "C" within Admin Tools
3) Remove the HDD safely from the ultrabay
4) Reboot

What's your recommendation?

Regards,
FRANK
Baertracks

Marc_G · #15 Post by **Marc_G** » Thu Mar 17, 2005 4:17 pm

Hi Frank-

Congratulations on getting to the point where you can actually do something!!! You're close... I can taste it!

If it were me, I would:

1. Make an image copy (Ghost, Drive Image, True Image, whatever) of the "D:" drive so that anything I do next, I could un-do.

2. Turn off the paging file (System Control Panel... Advanced... Performance... Advanced... Virtual Memory). This will remove a potential conflict. Once you've sorted everything out you'll eventually turn it back on.

3. Reboot (same drives in their same positions) to safe mode.

4. See if it will let you "Safely Remove" the ultrabay drive (which is C: at the moment) while Windows is up.

5A. If yes, then see if it will let you rename your D: drive to C: it will probably tell you it won't be effective until reboot. You'll need to rename C: (Ultrabay drive) to something else (E:) first. Since Paging is off, "C:" should be renamable.

5B. If no, remove the C: drive letter from the ultrabay drive, then try renaming the D: drive to C:. Again, probably it will say the change will be effective upon reboot.

6. Shut down, remove ultrabay drive, reboot into safe mode. (Contemplation, prayer optional).

7. Post results here. I'm on the edge of my seat.

8. If all is well, and the reboot works OK, you should be back to your internal drive as C: and you can turn pagefile back on. Then reboot in regular mode.

Marc

baertracks · #16 Post by **baertracks** » Thu Mar 17, 2005 5:36 pm

Thanks for the step by setp advice.

Unfortunately, I have to go out to a meeting this evening, so I will have to leave you on the "edge of your seat" until later tonight. Looks like it may be a long night. I'll keep you posted.

Regards,
FRANK
Baertracks

baertracks · #17 Post by **baertracks** » Thu Mar 17, 2005 11:47 pm

Marc;

This just isn't working out.

I tried to follow your step by step instructions. However, there is not an option provided in safe mode to safely eject the ultrabay drive (at least not one that I can see).

The Admin tools allowed me (at first) to remove the drive letter for the C drive in the ultrabay. It would not, however, allow me to rename the D (internal) drive (even with a conditioned reboot) because it is being used by the SYSTEM.

When I rebooted I ended up back at the infamous login "death" loop.

The next time that I succeeded in getting into safe mode it would not even let me remove the D drive name.

I'm out of ideas at the moment. Perhaps tomorrow will bring a fresh solution.

Thanks again for your assistance.

Regards
FRANK
Baertracks

#18 Post by **carbon_unit** » Fri Mar 18, 2005 12:05 am

Another repair option for XP is to boot to the CD, at the point it asks to install or repair with recovery console select install, then it will copy some files and usually give you another option to do a repair install. That will reinstall the key parts of the OS and fix any boot problems while leaving your programs and data intact. I have done it many times with only a few disasters. As always backup your vital data before trying this one. YMMV and all other disclaimer apply here.

CoolRunnings · #19 Post by **CoolRunnings** » Fri Mar 18, 2005 12:26 am

Noooo! Don't do the repair yet! That blows away the restore points. First try running a system restore from safe mode. That should put your registry back to normal where you can boot properly again. Start > Programs > Accessories > System Tools > System Restore. If it were a drive letter reassignment issue or a problem with the MBR, then it wouldn't likley let you into safe mode. I could be wrong on that one though... I would bet a registry hive swap (which is one of the things System Restore does) would fix it. Let me know how that goes for you. If it doesn't work, let me know.

P.S. I used to do support for Windows XP for Microsoft (for 3 years) before they sent it all to India...

Marc_G · #20 Post by **Marc_G** » Fri Mar 18, 2005 8:38 am

Frank-

Sorry to hear about the continued problems. The little gotcha about safely ejecting not being there in safe mode snagged me.

The reason for really wanting to be in safe mode is mostly a memory issue: without a page file, depending on the amount of RAM in the unit, you might not be able to boot.

I got around this on once my T42P by just turning off the page file, since I've got 1.5 GB RAM. So, XP can do a full boot, if just barely, without the page file

Just kidding of course, my typical boot comes in around 275MB.

Did it let you turn off the page file? How much RAM do you have?

At this point I'm with CoolRunnings: from safe mode, try a restore point, shut down, remove ultrabay drive, reboot. I've rarely had the restore points help my own problems, but then again I blow them away frequently.

I'll be checking in again here around 10:30 Eastern Time.

Good luck.

Marc

#21 Post by **carbon_unit** » Fri Mar 18, 2005 8:49 am

I will be watching this thread closely because I want to know how to fix these kind of problems without having to do the repair. I look forward to hearing more from CoolRunnings on this. I'm always looking for a better way to do things.

CoolRunnings · #22 Post by **CoolRunnings** » Fri Mar 18, 2005 9:15 am

Yeah, you're right Marc, System Restore isn't a cure-all for every problem but it's a life saver when it comes to registry corruption or when you have incorrect registry settings that are keeping the system from booting properly. One of the most handy articles we used to use in XP support relates to that:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307545

I'm eager to hear what happens here...

gazingwa · #23 Post by **gazingwa** » Fri Mar 18, 2005 10:01 am

Backup your data and reinstall, even if you nurse this xp installation back to health, it will be sluggish and will still give you more problems in the future, nothing beats a format.

baertracks · #24 Post by **baertracks** » Fri Mar 18, 2005 10:25 am

Sorry to report that at this point I can't even get the computer to boot in safe mode. I am in the Log On Death" Loop, i.e., when I log in I am immediately logged out and returned to the Log In screen prompt.

I've got three HDDs (all with WinXP installed) to work with:
- 40GB that came with the T42,
- 60GB (7200) on to which I have temporarily installed WinXP
- 80Gig from my T40 (that has all my data on it).

Any suggestions as to what to try next?

BTW, my "old" T40 has 2GB RAM. The new T42 has 512MB RAM.

FRANK

Marc_G · #25 Post by **Marc_G** » Fri Mar 18, 2005 10:43 am

Frank-

I'm bummed that this is still such a problem. With the continued problems, what are your objectives for the T40 and it's 80 GB drive?

Gazingwa's suggestion is foolproof, but means re-installing everything. Presumably any real data from the 80 GB can be recovered by using the T42 as a host. Just don't boot with both drives in the T42 or its own 40 GB drive might get corrupted.

Have you tried the FixMBR and FixBoot tools in the repair environment yet? I would definitely recover any data from the drive before doing this, even though these tools are supposed to be harmless.

I hate giving up. But at this point the time invested is comparable (or greater than) a complete reinstall of all your stuff. More time might not help. I wonder what changed such that now you can't get into safe mode.
With the page file off, the need for D: should be gone.

Which drive were you using as the experimental ultrabay drive when booting from the 80 GB drive?

I'm tempted to experiment with a 40 GB drive that I have that currently has the IBM preload on it. If I mounted it in the ultrabay (defacto making it D), unmount it, then tried booting from it, I would probably get the same logon/logoff loop. It would be good to have a clear "do this, then this" map of how to recover without making the problem worse. My parents in-law are here this weekend, so my time is pretty limited, but I think eventually I will do this. First I want to back up that preload image for quick reinstallation if I ever need it (I've got the CDs, but it takes 4 hours to do a factory load!).

The fact that you got so close, into safe mode, makes me think this is (or was) a recoverable situation, since I've been there before and survived. But maybe at this point things are such that recovery is more trouble than it's worth, once you back up your data.

Let us know what you decide to do.

Marc

#26 Post by **jdhurst** » Fri Mar 18, 2005 10:50 am

Up to WinXP SP1, I have successfully booted from either the main drive or the caddy with the same version of XP on both drives in the same physical machine. Post SP2, I lost a test drive with the same symptoms as you after trying to boot from the caddy (which is where your problems started). I was also playing with Partition Magic at the time, and I could never clearly determine where the fault was. I did conclude (possibly in error) that Windows Activation bit me. I wound up reimaging the drives. Bummer and cold comfort for you at this point, but I don't have anything else to offer that the other posters haven't already said. ... JD Hurst

baertracks · #27 Post by **baertracks** » Fri Mar 18, 2005 10:58 am

gazingwa wrote:Backup your data and reinstall, even if you nurse this xp installation back to health, it will be sluggish and will still give you more problems in the future, nothing beats a format.

I am thinking that I tend to agree with this approach. However, rather than reinstalling WinXP immediately on that drive, I would like to put the "old" 80GB drive from my T40 into the ultrabay drive of my new T42, and then copy over data to the new drive.

I have tried this, and it reads the old drive OK. However, when I try to copy over data folders from the old to new drive it inevitably gives me a "Cannot copy _______ file. Access Denied. Make sure that the disk is not full or write-protected and that the file is not currently in use."

I encountered this problem yesterday, but after I finally safe booted the drive I was able to copy over all my important files to a Maxtor USB backup drive without any problems. So, why am I getting this message now? And, more importantly, what can I do about it?

By the way, perhaps I should mention that my data includes about 150,000 files in 4,000 folders (an accumulation of ten years of work in 25 African countries). I'm a pack rat, and like to have all my old files on hand wherever I travel. So, I really need a way to copy stuff in a batch mode, not file by file.

Thanks for any and all advice.

FRANK
Baertracks

baertracks · #28 Post by **baertracks** » Fri Mar 18, 2005 11:09 am

jdhurst wrote:Up to WinXP SP1, I have successfully booted from either the main drive or the caddy with the same version of XP on both drives in the same physical machine. Post SP2, I lost a test drive with the same symptoms as you after trying to boot from the caddy (which is where your problems started). ... JD Hurst

I think that this sums up the problem pretty well, i.e. "Don't try booting from the caddy in a post WinXP SP2 environment."

In reference to Marc's last post, my long term intention is to install the 60Gig HD in my new T42. However, I do not yet have the CD restore drives for the T42 in order to do this.

For the moment (per my previous post), I would like to copy over datafiles and reinstall programs on the 40Gig drive that came with the T40. Are the "unable to copy" messages related to my "original" problem, or is there an "easy" solution for this one?

Thanks to everyone who has contributed to this thread.

FRANK
Baertracks

gazingwa · #29 Post by **gazingwa** » Fri Mar 18, 2005 11:24 am

And you don't have a current backup of vital data somewhere else???
When will people learn.

I have data stored on my thinkpad, desktop, and router that I sync roughly once a week, once a month i also ftp the vital items to my pc at work (weekends only, they get mad when i take up bandwidth) therefore even if there is a fire, I'm safe.

Even the files from work go home to my router for backup (the it department hasn't figured out we should have central storage with weekly offsite backups.)

Good luck in recovering your data, in some cases NTFS can stop you if you aren't using the same logon and password as you were when you put the data on the drive. Also, download Knoppix (linux on cd) it saved my rear a couple times, it can read ntfs partitions and send the data over your network somewhere else or on another local drive.

Leon · #30 Post by **Leon** » Fri Mar 18, 2005 11:28 am

gazingwa wrote: When will people learn.

Never. People generally "learn" after disaster strikes. Human nature, I guess.

Don't try this at home? - Swapping HDDs from a T40 to T42

Don't try this at home? - Swapping HDDs from a T40 to T42

Who is online