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6 Posts
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1889
June 30th, 2016 09:00
Drive setup gone wrong
Just got a second hand optiplex 980 i3, fitted a single drive installed win 7 all works fine, however just came to fit a second drive and have just realised l hadn't checked bios raid settings when l first installed windows, and the raid setting was set to raid1. When I installed the second drive it just tries to rebuild the mirror. If I turn off raid the single drive is not booting can I recover from this as I don't want a raid configuration.
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jackshack
6.4K Posts
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July 1st, 2016 09:00
Delete the RAID before disconnecting the 2nd drive. If you disconnect after completing the mirror, you will have 2 drives in RAID, and both need to have their boot codes re-written. The other problem you might have is stated in my first post. At least some Dell machines insist on having 2 eligible drives connected in order for the CTRL-i option to be enabled. If you look for the CTRL-i option with only one drive installed, you will never see it as it doesn't even pop up.
Carllock
6 Posts
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June 30th, 2016 13:00
Raid can be turned on and off in bios then you do the ctrl - I to build the raid you require.My problem is because the original install was on one drive even though the settings were set to raid 1, I now cannot add a second drive without it trying to rebuild the mirror. When I turn off raid in bios the single drive will not boot. So I guess it must write something in the boot sector that doesn't work when set to raid off. Set raid back to 01 and the single drive boots fine, add second drive and it once again just tries to rebuild mirror. I need just to have non raid twin drive system, but cannot, tried repair console on windows dvd to see if it would alter the the boot sector to single drive , but no good. Running out of ideas just cannot believe the only way is yet another install with raid set corectly this time.
jackshack
6.4K Posts
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June 30th, 2016 13:00
How are you turning off RAID? If you have the Intel on-board RAID it is usually necessary to use the CTRL-i feature to bring up the control menu and delete the RAID. I haven't done this in a while, but you used to get a message warning you that all data will be deleted. This isn't true for RAID 1, however, and if there are two drives installed, you wind up with two identical and bootable drives. If you started out with a single drive, however, you might not get the CTRL-i option. I know my old XPS-410 doesn't even present that option if only one drive is installed. The simplest way of solving your problem might be to allow the computer to build the mirror, and then go into the CTRL-i menu and delete the RAID. You should then be able to boot from the drive on port 0 and reinitialize the second drive.
jackshack
6.4K Posts
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July 1st, 2016 08:00
What I was getting at is that it is not enough to turn off RAID in the BIOS. You must use the CTRL-i menu to delete the RAID or to reset the drive controller to non-RAID. When you create a RAID, you put a special boot section on the component drives that overwrites the normal boot code. If you do not go through the correct process of deleting the RAID volume, the drive will not be bootable.
Carllock
6 Posts
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July 1st, 2016 09:00
OK I will mirror an extra drive just in case so will have spare if all goes wrong
Just a bit wary when it gives the warning about losing all data when deleting the raid.
Carllock
6 Posts
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July 1st, 2016 09:00
Got it I think.first will let it rebuild the mirror as back up, delete the raid set up under ctrl-i menu, then turn off raid in bios and hopefully will then boot with windows showing two drives?
Would it be safer to remove 2nd drive after mirror rebuild in case it goes wrong, then atleast I will save my data?
Carllock
6 Posts
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July 3rd, 2016 07:00
At worked out great many thanks for info.
jackshack
6.4K Posts
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July 4th, 2016 21:00
Excellent! Best of luck to you!