MBR Issue With Second Harddrive From Old System!

[wildman6801]

I have just finished building a Dual AMD MP 2400+ with 1 GB of memory. I have successfully installed Windows XP Pro, Red Hat Linux 9.0, Mandrake 9.0, SUSE 9.0 Pro, Free BSD 4.7, and Sun Solaris 9.0. After installing my second harddrive from an older system, I find the time it takes for the Windows XP splash screen to appear is really slow (1-2 minutes), in other words a black screen. I remember the second harddrive being installed as a second harddrive in my old system with Red Hat Linux 9.0 installed on it, and an NT partition. The drive contained the Master Boot Record (MBR). Windows 2000 was installed on the main harddrive as a second OS and set as the default boot. I am wondering if XP (or GRUB from Red Hat 9.0) might be trying to read the MBR off of this drive and thus taking so long to show it's splash screen. If so, how do I remove the MBR off of this second harddrive, without having to reformat the entire drive.

Note: Both the Primary and Secondary Harddrives on the new system are identical drives (same make, same model number, same size thus same performance)

Also I have searched Google, MSN Search, Yahoo Search and AllTheWeb.com for how to fix the problem? I also have spoken to my colleagues about it and most are saying to use Fdisk in the CMD prompt, but Fdisk is not available for Windows XP or any NT OS's for the matter. I do have Partition Magic 7.0 but it doesn't show if their is a boot record on the second harddrive. Only with the main harddrive!

[tomwalshco]

I'm no expert, but it has happened to me. I learned 1 thing - 1 drive has be the master, the other the slave. There should be jumper(s) on the second drive to set is as a slave. Go to the HDs website and under a Support link, you'll eventually find how to set this up correctly. I've found this info at Seagate and Maxtor sites.

[wildman6801]

I have already set the jumper on the second drive as a slave and the first drive as master.

[wildman6801]

UPDATE:

I see that Windows XP Pro doesn't have fdisk for it at the command line. I tried to use the fdisk /mbr command and it is not available. I looked inside of the Help and Support feature of XP and find that diskpart has replace it. I cannot seem to find a way to fix the boot record with this command. Does anyone know of a way to correct the MBR in XP, or a suggestion on how to fix the overall issue with an NT boot loader on the second and primary harrdrive, as listed in prior posts!

Thanks

[ultrasolve]

To be able to use the diskpart command boot into advanced startup options by pressing F8 at the end of POST and entering the safemode menu. Choose the option to boot into safe mode with command prompt this will bring you to a command prompt screen where you can enter the command diskpart and manage your disks from there. To get help on the diskpart tool at the command prompt type diskpart /?

[pawprint]

You need to install the recovery console from your XP pro disk to run the fixmbr command.

To install the Recovery Console as a startup option
With Windows XP running, insert your Windows XP CD in the drive, and click Exit when the installation options are displayed.
Click Start, click Run, and then type D:\i386\winnt32.exe /cmdcons Where D: is the CD-ROM drive letter, and then press Enter. (There is a space between .exe and the slash.)
Follow the instructions on screen to install the Recovery Console, and when the installation is complete, restart your computer.
The Recovery Console will show up in the list of available operating systems in the Startup menu. You must be an administrator to use the Recovery Console.

If the i386 directory is already installed on your computer (as might be the case in computers purchased with Windows XP pre-installed), you can use the same syntax as in Step 2, using the [path]\i386 directory without having to use the CD.

An alternative method is to boot to the CD and start WINNT.EXE, then when prompted to Install or Repair, click Repair, which installs the Recovery Console for you.

If Windows XP will not start, you can run the Recovery Console from the Setup CD.
After it is installed , to repair the master boot record type in fixmbr.
cheers, ~pawprint~