Dell dimension 4500 boot sequence

[dpw]

Hello,
I have a dell dimension 4500. After I purchased an iomega external hard drive, I changed the boot sequence to boot from CD first, Hard drive second and removable media third. I did this so I could keep the external hard drive connected to the computer at all times, even during start up.

Despite this change, the computer freezes during start up and will not boot properly when the external hard drive is connected. I then disabled the removable media from the bios and it still doesn't work. How can I get the computer to boot up without freezing when my new external hard drive is plugged in?

 

[o1die]

Set your drive as slave using the jumper on the drive. If it's sata, set it using maxblast 5.0, a free download off seagate's or maxtor's website.

 

[o1die]

No. Maxblast 5.0 comes with retail boxed maxtor or seagate drives, and the cd acts as a bootdisk. It should come with a sata driver if required. Windows 7 or vista doesn't need it.

 

[o1die]

You don't need to boot up with the external drive; windows 7 will detect it if you plug it in with your system already running and automatically set it up as a backup drive.

 

[das_stig]

External drive may not be given enough time to spin up before boot, hence freezing.

Look for an option to introduce a hdd spin up delay or delay in USB detection.

 

[ShaneG]

Hello Col W.

I was just looking for a lead to your problem and and stumbled on your thread, looks like they don't really understand the question fully.

To all offering advise, I work with "dpw" who posted the original question. The problem that he is describing is that after purchasing a new external USB HD, his laptop is now attempting to boot from the new ext drive during a system restart when the new drive is attached to the laptop. The obvious solution, which does work, is to simply unplug the USB cord from the laptop and allow it to boot up into Windows and then re-connect the ext drive and all works fine.

What he is trying to achieve is a solution that would configure the laptop to CHOOSE the internal HD as the default boot device, thus alleviating the need to plug and un-plug the drive during every system restart.

Hope this helps clear up all mis-interpretations of the issue at hand.

** All the air you can breath for a year to the first one to solve the problem! **

Cheers!
Shane G.