Boot from ATPI CD Rom failure

G'morning,

First order of business is to change my status from Intermediate to Wizard's Apprentice please. lol

I am trying to do a clean install of Windows XP Home. I have ensured that the BIOS boot sequence is CD, A, C. I am following Paul Thurrott's Step-by-Step Clean Installing Windows XP. I am on Step 1 and already hitting a brick wall (go figure lol).

I have placed my Windows XP Home Update CD into the CD Rom drive and rebooted (8 times?). The only message I see before C boots up is "Boot from ATPI CD Rom failure ". That CD Rom has been working fine (no signs of failure) and I can run set up from C.

Your suggestions please?

 

Hi Joy,

I'm assuming from this thread http://www.windowsbbs.com/showthread.php?t=46687 that you went into the case, That CD Rom has been working fine Was that after you switched/added the new drive?

So my first suggestion would be to make sure the connections are correct or not loose. This sounds very like a hardware issue with the Rom.

Regards - Charles

 

Hi Charles,

Yes, a 2nd hard drive was added approximately two weeks ago as a slave. The CD Rom has been working fine since then. The only thing it doesn't seem to be doing is booting up the Update disk. Can the boot ability of the CD Rom fail and every other use be working?

FYI: The initial intent was to use the original drive as a backup. I found your advice was sound and very much appreciated; however, in an effort to maintain harmony in my home, that plan has changed. The original disk will be used to house Windows with all other programs being installed on the new drive. I felt a clean install would be best for the original drive (replacing the .ini file and eliminating the existing two installs).

While this new approach is new to me and a bit confusing, I do hope you understand how important harmony can be. It does, however, raise a question in my mind. Would it be best to install Office XP on the OS drive for all the shared files (I also use FrontPage)?

 

A stretch - I doubt that. Can you "explore" the cd - read the files? EDIT: Ok, Pete addressed that question.

Don't see any problem with doing it that way.

Office is a complex suite and I think it would be better to install it on the OS drive

Regards - Charles

 

Yes, I can see the CD Rom drive and explore the Update files from Explorer. I have also cleaned the CD itself.

One thing I noticed in Explorer is the following drive lettering and am wondering if it could have an effect:

D: CD-RW drive
E: Slave drive
F: CD ROM drive

Now if Windows is looking for D, the update disk is not in that drive. Could this be the problem? If so, is there a way to change the drive lettering?

I raise this thought because my CD-RW drawer won't open on it's own. (I can force it open and it still writes ... so worse case, I could use that drive.) The Device Manager shows no problems for either CD drive.

*scratching head*

 

Hi Joy,

One thing I noticed in Explorer is the following drive lettering and am wondering if it could have an effect:

D: CD-RW drive
E: Slave drive
F: CD ROM drive

Now if Windows is looking for D, the update disk is not in that drive. Could this be the problem? If so, is there a way to change the drive lettering?


Forgot about drive lettering.

To change: Start > run > type diskmgmt.msc > ok

In the panel that comes up > right click on the Rom and you'll see change drive letter paths in the menu.

Regards - Charles

 

Hi Charles,

Perhaps my new title should be Buggy Wizard's Apprentice? I really really thank you for your patience.

I ran diskmgmt.msc. Only three drives are listed ... C, E and F (The missing D is the CD-RW). To change the Rom drive letter, my choices are only F through Z.

Your thoughts wise wizard?

 

D: CD-RW drive
E: Slave drive
F: CD ROM drive

I have a question about something that I do not understand.

Is E: a Hard Drive ? If so why is it inbetween CDROMS ?

Do you have your drives MANUALLY lettered ?

BillyBob

 

Hi Billy Bob,

E is a new hard drive that was recently mounted as a slave. It was installed by my roommate and I don't know if he manually lettered it ... although that would surprise me (can ask this evening).

Joy

 

NorthernJoy

Thanks for the reply.

Unless something is new that I am not aware of then the Hard drives should be lettered sequencially. And the CDROMS would then be changed.

For example.

1 HD existed would be C: The CDROM would be D:

A 2nd HD was added as a slave. That should be D: and the CDROM would change to E:

At least that is the way it always has been for me.

And this is the reason I have my CDROMS MANUALLY set to S: AND T: on one machine. That way I was able to add a 2nd HD or add partitions to the existing without messing up the CDROMS.

My Wifes' machine started out with C: D: E: HDs CDROMS S: T:

She neded more room so I added a 2nd HD and made it F: G: H: The CDROMS were not effected.

BillyBob

 

Hi Joy,

Yep, drive lettering is such a PITA when it doesn't work

From BillyBob
1 HD existed would be C: The CDROM would be D:

A 2nd HD was added as a slave. That should be D: and the CDROM would change to E:

At least that is the way it always has been for me.
That's what should have occurred, why it didn't...

Ok, lets try the following:
In the Device manager, uninstall the 2nd HD (E) and the two Roms and shut down.

Disconnect the two Roms physically.

Bootup with the Roms physically disconnected. The HD at this point should be D. If it's not, stop and post back - something wrong with that HD, perhaps the jumpering or the way it's connected.

Then shut down and reconnect the Roms. Reboot, they should now be E & F.

Before you begin and after as well, just as a matter of making sure that jumpering/connections are ok and what you expect, go into DM and do the following: right click on the 2nd HD and the two Roms > properties. In the general tab look at the locations: 0 is master, 1 is slave.

To a MOD (Pete if you get to this before anyone else) this thread should be in the hardware section I think.

Regards - Charles

 

G'morning all,

First of all, my apologies for getting off topic. Thank you for moving my post.

I have good news and not so good news.

When my roommate came home last night, he saw my frustration and took over. (Unfortunately this happened before I saw your last message Charles.) He tried several ways to get the clean install to work and failed. So he went into the computer and made the new disk the main and left the second/original disk unconnected.

The good news is the Windows XP Update correctly opened the MS-DOS portion of Setup and the install went smoothly using my CD Rom. I partitioned the new/larger disk during setup allowing for an OS area and the balance for data. I have gotten all of the critical updates installed and my Norton anti-virus program/definitions current. My needs are met and I only lost the last two weeks of business email (small sigh). At least I can get back to work.

There's even more good news. The drive lettering is ok now.

C: operating system drive
D: data/programs drive
E: CD-RW
F: CD Rom

Can you please direct me to an article describing how to add a second/slave drive and not mess up the drive lettering? I can't explain what happened; however, I would like to avoid these problems in the future.

The not so good news is that when I boot up, I am still getting the "Boot from ATPI CD Rom failure" message. I find this very ironic. The ROM is working fine installing all of my programs. I am praying the new disk does not fail because I am running out of bandaids. lol Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you all again for your patience. You are providing an excellent resource with this BBS and you deserve a pat on the back.

Warm regards.

Joy
Wizard's Apprentice

 

I would suggest that you get the 2nd HD cleaned up formated and installed as a SLAVE BEFORE you get too much software installed. If you do not you could suffer problems later as your CDROMS will change.

I can't explain what happened either. But there is no way that I know of to add an HD without changing the lettering of the CDROMS. It should go in as at least E: ( the HD ) Unless you partition it. Then it would be E: F: etc.

BillyBob

 

That is what I was looking for. That is what I have done on two of my machines.

BillyBob

 

Hi Joy,

At this point, I would now now connect what was the original C drive as the slave - watch the jumpering - should now be jumpered as slave. Then from the other thread, I think Pete explained how to format the old C. If not, go into diskmgmt.msc > right click > properties > format.

Thinking about this a little more, the new drive may end up as G, if it does that's fine.

Be sure to tell us how this saga ends

Regards - Charles

 

shhhhh be vewy vewy qwiet ... nobody make any fast moves. The slave drive is installed, the drive lettering is perfect (I now have A, C, D, E, X, Y) and I get to save the recent data I lost. Will wonders never cease! Thank you my heros!

Yes ... but ... remember that it was giving me the same message repeatedly yesterday WITH a CD in it. I checked the BIOS boot up and it is set at CDROM, A, C. I was thinking I could make a new boot up disk and then change the BIOS boot up to A, CDROM, C ... or just ignore it.

Did you know that the optical drives have to both have a CD in them before Disk Management recognizes them? lol Yet another tricky moment.

Any harm leaving the optical drives as X and Y? (that's a new term for me and I love it ... I'll be techie speakin' before we know it lol)

I am off to get the data I need and to format the slave drive. The saga is nearly complete.

Joy

 

Hi Joy, great that it all worked

No harm in the X & Y designation - I don't do that myself, got used to E & F. As Pete pointed out, it does avoid confusion for the wnwary.

My opticals W/O discs are listed and can open the drawers and change the drive paths, or at least the option comes up, didn't actually do it. This may depend on the BIOS or the firmware perhaps, I don't know. Pete or BillyBob may have more insight on this issue.

Regards - Charles

 

I would double check the jumper settings on the optical drives. It sounds like the harddrives are set correctly, but I would guess that one of the optical drives is set to CS (Cable Select) and is on a 40 lead cable with the other drive set as master or slave.
For the sake of simplicity, one drive on each ribbon cable should be set as master, the other drive on each should be set as slave.

If the drives are having problems, you can set them as Cable Select. We could explain this to you if you need to try.

I think there is a basic configuration problem there somewhere. The read/no read is not normal and you should find out why.

If you have both the opticals on the secondary ide ribbon cable, try swapping them as master/slave (sorry, may change the drive letterring).

The other thing that may fix unexplained problems is a firmware update. The drive manufacturer issues firmware updates to overcome problems that were not expected when the drive was marketed. These can be found at the drive manufacturer's website. They are not hard to do, but you must be careful to be updating the correct drive (from a boot floppy you can do it with all the other drives disconnected).

Matt