Hi, I purchased the Plextor W2410TA/SW IDE CD-RW and am getting a disk error on bootup. The operating system is Windows 2000 Professional. I am running a PIII 1 GHz ASUS TUSL2-C ATX with the following hard drives: Seagate Cheetah 18Gig SCSI on SCSI ID 0 WD 9Gig SCSI on SCSI ID 1 Both hard drives are connected to the Adaptec 2940U2W SCSI card. The Plextor comes up in IDE 0 At first I connected the CD-RW to the onboard primary IDE slot on the motherboard, and then moved the ribbon cable over to the Secondary. I have the same result. I get a message on the bios that says BOOT DISK ERROR. When I reboot, the system starts up fine. It's when I shut the system down and and it is off for a few hours, then start up again that I get the disk error. Can you tell me what is going on and how I can resolve this? I tested the CD-RW and it works great. Thanks so much, Vic

I could be out in left field. From your description, it sounds like the BIOS is set to boot from IDE some where along the line. When you didn't have any IDE devices, the boot process continued on to your SCSI drives and booted find. You said that "When I reboot, the system starts up fine. It's when I shut the system down and and it is off for a few hours, then start up again that I get the disk error." Is that a power off/on reboot (hard) or three finger reboot (soft)? And when you have turned off the system, what happens if you turn it back on after a couple of minutes? Have you try searching the Microsoft Knowledge Base on the Microsoft site?

Hi, Thanks so much for your reply! When I do a regular shut down, and then power up a few minutes later, the system loads fine, no disk error. However, when I do a regular shut down, and then power up several hours later, such as the next day, then I get the error. I haven't checked the MS knowledge base yet. I didn't even think to check there. What do you think could cause this? Thanks so much! Vic

I suggested Microsoft KB because I did a quick check in Tech Net (searched on boot process) and came across a reference to the Adaptec 2940 card. While I didn't read it all, it didn't seem to apply as it was regarding booting in a cluster. Then I remember that there were a lot of Adaptec references in Tech Net. You know your setup better than any one. Does your BIOS list any IDE devices to boot from or are the set to SCSI? How old is your ASUS system board? Because it will boot up okay after a couple of minutes but not after many hours, maybe your BIOS battery? Have you checked out the Adaptec and ASUS web sites and forums?

Hi, Thank so much! I think I found something on the MS KB. I read a few things and one suggestion said that I might want to put a delay on the hard drives. Something about the drives are not finished spinning and the motherboard processor is faster. I kind of get the idea. Anyway, I went to the config screen of the adaptec card and looked for the boot spot to where I could put a dely but didnt see it. Then I thought maybe I could disable quick boot. What do you think? Thanks so much!! Vic

Disabling quick boot should introduce a delay. Another way would be to boot off of a floppy. But why would you need a delay now. You had been booting just fine before the CD drive was added, right? I still find it strange that adding an IDE CD drive would cause a SCSI boot problem. What exactly was the BOOT DISK ERROR you were receiving? And in your BIOS, do you have the CD-RW IDE channel set to CD-ROM or AUTO. I think if it was set to AUTO, that could have created your problem. Let me know.

Hi Michael, Well, looks like I figured out what was going on. I got another weird message on bootup. Windows 2000>Root\System32\ntoskrnl.exe I rebooted by doing the three finger salute, ctrl alt del and nothing happened. I had backup so I formatted both drives. Then, the fun began. I set the IDE CD-RW as the boot drive. Get this. The drive booted and the OS start up screen came on, but as it was copying the files, it stopped. It said it could not create a Windows Media folder. As I was taring what little hair I have left out of my head, I retraced the steps. Then I thought, maybe the issue was with copying files from IDE to SCSI. So, I re-installed my 32X NEC SCSI CD ROM and set it as the boot drive. It worked. I also changed the boot sequence, where the SCSI CD ROM is first, the IDE CD-RW is 2nd and the floppy is 3rd. No issues. The system works fine. Maybe that corrupt file was the reason the system got that error, but I am not certain. I want to thank you for your help. It was your suggestions that made me realize there was something wrong with the configurations somewhere. The best part is that the tech friends I have had no clue. I take it you are in the tech field since you had the answer all along. If you are not in the tech field, you might want to consider it. Thanks again Michael. Vic