Stupid computer!! -- help!!!!

HELP!

My PC wont boot to windows. (I HOPE THIS MAKES SENSE TO THOSE THAT MAY BE ABLE TO HELP!)

Got win 7 installed on a pair of Western Digital HDD's in RAID.

PC goes through BIOS boot ok, but wont find the HDD - only the other two in the system (just used for storage)

However if i go into the Bios, it is picking up both HDD's individually as being plugged into SATA ports!

But if i go into the boot preferences i cant choose that drive (i.e. the one RAID'ed drive) to be in any priority to boot from. It only gives me floppy and the mass storage drives!

Therefore i checked all the connections in the tower, and even unplugged the other two so they were not causing any problems......But same problem.

Just wont even try and boot from them/it!

Any ideas? is it the boot sector that has gone on the drives? i hope not they are only 2 years old ish!

any help much appreciated!

Hardware or software RAID?

Are the storage drives also in RAID? can you swap one or both for the drive with the OS on, and see if it picks it up in the BIOS?

*Disclaimer, I only have a vague idea what Im talking about, dont tell my employers!

hardware RAID, And not the other two are just old stand alone drives.

Sounds like your RAID controller might be shot

am i right in thinking that the RAID controller is a hardware component on the main board?

if so what does that take to swap out? and will i still be able to use/retrieve the data on the drives? or will it mean a reformat?

Sorry if that is a simple question, i have some knowage of pc's, but as for the RAID side of it, a mate sorted that out when i built the PC, and never really read into it much!

[flymo]

disconnect one of your mirrored drives and attempt to boot. If that doesnt work, try the other one out of the pair.


...hang on, did it ever boot on these drives? Has it worked and suddenly stopped working?

The RAID controller (think the correct name is Disk Array Controller) is a physical hardware component yes, this link might help : http://www.bestpricecomputers.co.uk/...controller.htm
you should be able to swap this out and then boot from the drives without a reformat.

EDIT: assuming that is in fact the faulty component

has it booted before or is this a fresh install? if so it will prob be lak of drivers at install otherwise corrupted boot sector would be my best guess.

been working fine since windows 7 came out, so getting on for a year i think!

so i can only assume that it is a hardware malfunction! what is the best way (without spending money first) of working out if boot sector on drive, or the controller?

Flymo, I am running RAID 0, so no mirror, this is what concerns me about loosing all my data! It has been one of those i will back it all up at some point!