PC won't boot if Hard Drive is plugged in.

anfearg

Reputable
Mar 18, 2017
6
0
4,510
my pc has been working fine for the past 2 years but as of recently my HDD stops my pc from booting.

i have an ssd as my boot drive and a 1tb samsung laptop ssd from my old laptop. everything has been working fine up until today, when i restarted my pc i got to the windows boot screen and it just boot looped (only left it on for about 2 mins cun my ssd boots in 10 - 20 seconds), i restarted the pc another time to the same result, then i unplugged all of my io except for the screen and the same thing happened. i unplugged my 1tb hard drive and the pc booted normally.
i then booted it with the hard drive plugged in and it wouldn't boot, i unpluuged the sata data cable mid boot and it booted in as soon as i removed it, when i plugged the hard drive back in when i was on the desktop everything worked normally.

(sorry if this has bad grammar i wrote this quickly)
 
Solution
In many instances an OS will not boot to the OS when it encounters a defective secondary drive.
Can you install the secondary HDD in your system as a USB external drive? Assuming it's detected by the system, test the drive with a HDD diagnostic program.
Another alternate way to test the drive is to boot the system with only the boot drive connected. Access the BIOS and ensure the "hot plug" or "hot swap" (or some such) setting for the SATA connector to which you'll connect the secondary drive is set to Enabled. (I'm assuming your BIOS contains that setting...many older motherboards do not). After the system boots, internally-connect the HDD in the system and assuming it's detected in the system, test it with a HDD diagnostic program...
In many instances an OS will not boot to the OS when it encounters a defective secondary drive.
Can you install the secondary HDD in your system as a USB external drive? Assuming it's detected by the system, test the drive with a HDD diagnostic program.
Another alternate way to test the drive is to boot the system with only the boot drive connected. Access the BIOS and ensure the "hot plug" or "hot swap" (or some such) setting for the SATA connector to which you'll connect the secondary drive is set to Enabled. (I'm assuming your BIOS contains that setting...many older motherboards do not). After the system boots, internally-connect the HDD in the system and assuming it's detected in the system, test it with a HDD diagnostic program.

The point of all this of course is to determine whether you're dealing with a defective HDD.

Of course if you have another HDD (or SSD) connect that drive as a secondary drive and see what happens.
 
Solution

anfearg

Reputable
Mar 18, 2017
6
0
4,510
the hdd is detected by my system after booting in and everything runs fine after boot, ill check for any damaged sectors and report back, thanks for the advise
 
Are you now indicating that the system DOES BOOT to the OS with the HDD connected when you say "everything runs fine after boot"? I thought the problem was the system didn't boot when the HDD was connected? But there was no problem when that secondary HDD was disconnected?
 

anfearg

Reputable
Mar 18, 2017
6
0
4,510
the secondary hdd is the drive causing the problem i wiped it and reformatted it and it's working fine (the read speeds were 1mbps) and now they're ok i have no clue what happened because there were no bad sectors after i reformatted it (and i couldn't check beforehand cuz read speed were so slow) i saved my documents but i lost my whole steam library which is a pain, thanks for the help.