OK here's the scoop. I installed a new 40GB 7200rpm Maxtor HDD to supplement my current one. I installed XP on the new drive, works like a charm. Now what I'd like to do is to format the other drive, set the Maxtor as master and use the old drive for backup. The only problem is that when I set the Maxtor drive to master, I get something like an ntldll error on startup and can't boot into Windows. They both have XP installed on them. If I formatted the other drive and set the Maxtor drive to master, would I be able to boot into Windows off of it?

Sorry for the long post

You'll not be able to do what you say without a bit of work... XP installs an OS loader onto the bootsector on your primary master disk... Without this, XP won't load...

You should be able to "fix" this by moving boot.ini, ntldr and ntdetect.com to the Maxtor hdd...

If that doesn't work (I can't remember if there is something else you should do when copying those files), try this:

Hope this helps you out

I'll try that, hope it works.

Thanks a lot

I've been a lookin' but can't find those files anywhere. Where on the HDD are they?

Yes, but where exactly are they?

Even when enabling "Show All Files" you have to untick the "Hide Syetm Files" option.

They should be on the first partition of your first hard drive, commonly known as C: for windows users.

Ah there they are.

No problem.

Those files are not the bootloader, they handle post bootloader. The NT bootloader is installed either onto the MBR of the disk or the boot sector of the first partition.

SH,

So what files would I copy? I tried their suggestions and it told me that the OS failed to load.

Thanks

Once the files are copied to the new partition, you still have to activate that partition in order to make it bootable.

You'll also have to edit the BOOT.INI file so that the XP line reads like this :

multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINNT="Microsoft Windows XP" /fastdetect

Thanks I'll try that.

BTW the Microsoft Windows XP can be edited so I know what HDD I'm booting off of, is this correct?

Thanks once again

You can change the "Microsoft Windows XP" to "Mama's Home Made Cooking" if you feel like it, it won't affect anything.

OK thanks.

It worked! Thanks guys.

Now to use drive C as a backup (new one is on D, wonder if I can change it without having to change all the program paths) I want to format it. Could I just erase all the files that are hidden or visible?

OK, we need a recap here.

You've moved your OS to your new drive which is now the master drive. In this case, we'll refer to this partition as C:.

The previous primary partition should now be known as D:. Is this the drive you want to format ? You can moves programs that are installed on it with an Utility such as Powerquest Drive Mapper. It will move the programs & change all the references to the new location.

Am I making any sense here ?