Windows Installing Across Two Drives

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DravidDavid

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#136188 18-Nov-2013 12:12

What is up with that?

I've come across this three times now. Windows 7 32 or 64 bit seems to want to install boot files to one drive and use the drive you actually picked in the setup wizard for the rest.

Other people have described this phenomenon on the Microsoft forums, but from the ones I've seen, Microsoft swears black and blue that it shouldn't do that. Other forums suggest just starting from scratch and reformatting. Has anyone else seen this happen? I just finished troubleshooting a machine with boot issues after a power cut.

Turns out the SSD was selected for boot, but the bootable drive was actually the drive used for storage instead. Set the storage drive as the boot device and the computer obviously sourced all the other OS files from the SSD as it booted in under 4 seconds.

I'm thinking re-formatting and starting from scratch might be the more time efficient way of fixing this once and for all anyway.

andrewNZ

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#936559 18-Nov-2013 12:17

I've had it a few times in the past. I was wondering if it was down to which disk was connected to SATA port 0 or something like that, but I never looked into it.

Now I just disconnect all other drives, that way you cant pick the wrong disk, and the installer cant pull these kinds of shenanigans.

DravidDavid

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#936579 18-Nov-2013 12:40

Glad I'm not alone!

SSD is connected to SATA_0 and the other two drives to SATA_3 and SATA_4. Have no idea how it decides to prioritize them. It also does it when trying to repair an install. If you have any other drives plugged in other than the one you want to repair, the installer won't find any previously installed copies of Windows and then BS you into thinking it's done something by writing a master boot record to a disk without windows on it!

But you're right. Every build from now on starts with one drive and others will be added later once the OS is set up...Will certainly save me a lot of time and effort later.

Gilco2

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#936588 18-Nov-2013 12:59

I have had that a few times as well. Now I do the same as AndrewNZ and disconnect all other drives then once installed connect the other drives up.
It may not supposed to install across 2 drives but it does at times for some strange reason

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CYaBro

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#936590 18-Nov-2013 13:04

Windows 7 & 8 will always create a small boot partition (100MB in Win7 and 350MB in Win8.)
I think it will always create it on Drive 0, so whatever drive is listed first in the BIOS or connected to the first SATA port.
So if your SSD isn't Drive 0 then it will create the boot partition on whatever drive is.

Opinions are my own and not the views of my employer.

Behodar

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#936597 18-Nov-2013 13:05

DravidDavid: Have no idea how it decides to prioritize them.

I'm not certain that it's Windows' fault; I run OS X and have four drives and while my SSD and biggest HDD are usually assigned to "disk0" and "disk1", they do sometimes change around (they were disk0 and disk3 a few days ago). Maybe the BIOS/EFI sometimes detects them in a different order.

Getting back to the original question, like other posters I always physically disconnect other drives when installing a new OS.

Ragnor

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#936867 18-Nov-2013 19:24

If you want to be 100% sure you can install with only your OS drive connected first then add your other drives after that.