Question C: Drive not recognized ?

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Badger51

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Sep 2, 2015
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Swapping drives from old pc to another...
Windows 10 Desktop
C: Drive (from original PC) not being recognized.

Get non system drive error.

Can reboot with USB windows but can't access Drive

Drive appears as a "Windows" drive when checked on other PC

Any suggestions?

Tried swapping cables

Confirmed that C: Drive is in SATA 0 slot
 
USAFRet

USAFRet

Titan
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Mar 16, 2013
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Badger51 said:
Swapping drives from old pc to another...
Windows 10 Desktop
C: Drive (from original PC) not being recognized.

Get non system drive error.

Can reboot with USB windows but can't access Drive

Drive appears as a "Windows" drive when checked on other PC

Any suggestions?

Tried swapping cables

Confirmed that C: Drive is in SATA 0 slot
Click to expand...
This often fails.

And the greater the difference between old and new, the more likely it is to fail.



Get non system drive error.
Click to expand...
What is the exact error?


But in any case, this will almost certainly require a full OS wipe and reinstall.

Please give us the entire parts list.
Make/model of everything.
 
B

Badger51

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Sep 2, 2015
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Fair point...

From the top....I had an older PC with a second HD that I used for data.

I swapped the 2nd Drive into a new PC installation.

Along the way, I removed the C: Drive, to review some data on the drive.

When I returned the C:drive to the original installation, my system will not boot.

I can boot from a Windows USB but my C: Drive is not booting, nor is it visible.

For instance, I used the Windows Repair option on the USB stick, but boot sequence could not be edited onto the C Drive
 
USAFRet

USAFRet

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Mar 16, 2013
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Badger51 said:
Fair point...

From the top....I had an older PC with a second HD that I used for data.

I swapped the 2nd Drive into a new PC installation.

Along the way, I removed the C: Drive, to review some data on the drive.

When I returned the C:drive to the original installation, my system will not boot.

I can boot from a Windows USB but my C: Drive is not booting, nor is it visible.

For instance, I used the Windows Repair option on the USB stick, but boot sequence could not be edited onto the C Drive
Click to expand...
OK....

That appears to be a case where the original OS was isntalled, with both drives connected.

In that instance, the small boot partition ends up on the other drive.
Remove that, or it dies, no boot for you.

Yes, the OS is on the drive you specified. But the boot partition is not.
 
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Badger51

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Sep 2, 2015
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That could be, although I'm not sure the second drive was part of the original installation.

Open to starting from scratch......Can I reinstall the Windows onto what I hope will be a boot drive?
 
USAFRet

USAFRet

Titan
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Mar 16, 2013
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Badger51 said:
That could be, although I'm not sure the second drive was part of the original installation.

Open to starting from scratch......Can I reinstall the Windows onto what I hope will be a boot drive?
Click to expand...
Absolutely.

Have only ONE drive physically connected.

Then....

How To - Windows 10 clean install tutorial

If you are looking for the Windows 11 Clean install tutorial, you can find that here: Windows 11 Clean install tutorial (Click here) Otherwise, welcome to the Windows 10 Clean install tutorial This tutorial is intended to help you, step by step, to perform a clean install of Windows...
forums.tomshardware.com forums.tomshardware.com
 
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Badger51

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Full moon today? Not having good luck today...

1)Created a USB Windows Installation Disk (from computer #2 -the new one)
Both Windows 10 machines

2)Have only the physical C: Drive installed in the old PC

3) After going thru the steps to install windows, (Selecting the advanced option-since Windows is not installed)

4) I get the following error message:

Drive 0-Partition 1 128mb MSR (Reserved)
Drive 0-Partition 2 3726 GB Primary

No config possible or USB or IEE1394 drives.

Options to format drives are greyed out and unresponsive

The Partion 2 is referring to the second drive on my new PC. The old PC, the only I am trying to reinstall windows has only the 500 gb drive installed as SATA 0

I went back to the new PC, Computer #2 and removed the physical drive that serves a D: Drive.

I reloaded the USB Windows Installation drive and same results as shown above.

How do I get the USB installation routine to recognize my "new" C: drive as SATA 0?

Would it help to format the "new" c: drive?
I could install it as a second or third SATA drive on the new PC and re-format it?

Appreciate your patience and assistance.

Thanks
 
stonecarver

stonecarver

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Nov 18, 2019
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Sure you could put it into your new computer and delete all partition than format it in Disk Management.

But better is use new computer with all IT"S DRIVES disconnected. Throw that "c" drive on there and start windows install on that old drive on new machine. I only want you to get to the part where you delete partitions. Delete them so drive is raw, STOP don't format. Manually turn off machine. Now put old drive back into old system and see if you can move forward installing windows 10 there.

I have had issues where using Microsofts USB tool to make your OS installer just refuse to work on some older PC's.

I switched to Rufus to always build mine and so far so good.
 
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Badger51

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Sending up the white flag on this one....

Continue to have problems with Windows Installation recognizing my C: Drive.

No drives are shown when selecting target drive....Unable to load drivers, even after copying driver files to USB stick.

Thanks for all the suggestions and ideas...
At this point, $50 is a lot less than the time I put in !!
 
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