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Installing Vista on External HD

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  • 11-11-2013 8:50pm
    #1
    Adamcp898
    Registered Users Posts: 5,469 ✭✭✭


    Alright lads, I've a bit of a problem here. I have an old laptop running Windows Vista that has suddenly decided it can't see the hard drive (I get 'no operating system found' at boot and BIOS tells me 'no IDE device present') but I took it out and put it in an enclosure and hooked it up to a newer laptop running Windows 8 and low and behold everything is there and can be accessed.

    Now I know this more than likely means it's not the hard drive that has failed and is probably the motherboard or a lead in between that's gone but I'm wondering, how can I go about wiping and doing a fresh install of Vista on the drive whilst it's connected via USB to the new laptop without compromising the Windows 8 installation?

    I'd rather not go creating a dual boot partition to have both Windows 8 and Vista on the new laptop and then go about transferring the partition to the hard drive so is what I'm looking to do possible at all?


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    #2
    bonzodog2
    Registered Users Posts: 6,221 ✭✭✭bonzodog2


    Well you could put the drive into the W8 laptop and install Vista on it, but it would detect the chipset and drivers etc for the W8 laptop mobo, so it probably wouldn't work completely if you then put it back in the older laptop, also if the old one can't see the disk from BIOS, when you know the disk works, whats the point?


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    #3
    advertsfox
    Registered Users Posts: 2,699 ✭✭✭advertsfox


    Adamcp898 wrote: »
    Alright lads, I've a bit of a problem here. I have an old laptop running Windows Vista that has suddenly decided it can't see the hard drive (I get 'no operating system found' at boot and BIOS tells me 'no IDE device present') but I took it out and put it in an enclosure and hooked it up to a newer laptop running Windows 8 and low and behold everything is there and can be accessed.

    Now I know this more than likely means it's not the hard drive that has failed and is probably the motherboard or a lead in between that's gone but I'm wondering, how can I go about wiping and doing a fresh install of Vista on the drive whilst it's connected via USB to the new laptop without compromising the Windows 8 installation?

    I'd rather not go creating a dual boot partition to have both Windows 8 and Vista on the new laptop and then go about transferring the partition to the hard drive so is what I'm looking to do possible at all?
    First off, you can't install it to an external drive like your requesting but not to worry because your issue sounds resolvable.

    On the laptop, it sounds like the BIOS preferences are incorrect on the laptop because "no operating system found" is not a Vista error, its a old school DOS error. Windows Vista onwards require a SATA setup, not IDE. There should be a preference for your hard drive that needs to be changed to SATA / AHCI. What's the laptop make and model?


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    #4
    Adamcp898
    Registered Users Posts: 5,469 ✭✭✭Adamcp898


    advertsfox wrote: »
    Sounds like the BIOS preferences are incorrect on the laptop because "no operating system found" is not a Vista error, its a old school DOS error. Windows Vista onwards require a SATA setup, not IDE. There should be a preference for your hard drive that needs to be changed to SATA / AHCI. What's the laptop make and model?

    Didn't even think of that.

    It's a HP Pavillion dv6552ea. It's an old machine that isn't used for anything other than internet and viewing photos but I'd rather try and keep it running for as long as possible before finally tipping it so I was thinking on doing a fresh install to see if that solved things. Unfortunately I won't have the laptop at hand now until the weekend at least so I guess I'll have to wait until then.


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    #5
    advertsfox
    Registered Users Posts: 2,699 ✭✭✭advertsfox


    Adamcp898 wrote: »
    Didn't even think of that.

    It's a HP Pavillion dv6552ea. It's an old machine that isn't used for anything other than internet and viewing photos but I'd rather try and keep it running for as long as possible before finally tipping it so I was thinking on doing a fresh install to see if that solved things. Unfortunately I won't have the laptop at hand now until the weekend at least so I guess I'll have to wait until then.
    Yes do get to that because I'm very confident its the issue. For now, you may as well take a copy / backup of your documents from the drive in question to your new PC.


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    #6
    Adamcp898
    Registered Users Posts: 5,469 ✭✭✭Adamcp898


    advertsfox wrote: »
    Yes do get to that because I'm very confident its the issue. For now, you may as well take a copy / backup of your documents from the drive in question to your new PC.

    Finally got back to this laptop, there is no option in the BIOS set it to IDE or SATA?

    Tried booting without the DVD drive attached and with just one stick of memory, can get any life out of it.


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    #7
    advertsfox
    Registered Users Posts: 2,699 ✭✭✭advertsfox


    Adamcp898 wrote: »
    Finally got back to this laptop, there is no option in the BIOS set it to IDE or SATA?

    Tried booting without the DVD drive attached and with just one stick of memory, can get any life out of it.
    Have you got a Vista disc to run the built in startup repair in case its MBR / BCD related?


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    #8
    Adamcp898
    Registered Users Posts: 5,469 ✭✭✭Adamcp898


    advertsfox wrote: »
    Have you got a Vista disc to run the built in startup repair in case its MBR / BCD related?

    I just can't figure out what's the problem. I tried booting using a Vista install disc and neither startup repair or a clean install could see the hard drive either.

    As a last effort I took the HDD and put it in a caddy and hooked it up to another laptop and using disc management deleted the main C: volume. I didn't touch the D: recovery partition, format, or change the now unallocated space from NTFS (which it was before deletion) and low a behold when I put it into the laptop again the Vista install disc recognised it and I did a fresh install.

    Problem solved I thought and so I spent yesterday updating Windows and put a few minor programs back on it. Keeping in mind that due to the ~7 years of Vista updates the laptop restarted successfully several times, but this morning when I turned it on it was back to the ''No OS'' error. I tried deleting the D: recovery volume (which was redundant now anyway) using disc management like I did with the C: volume before but I got no joy. I haven't tried deleting the C: volume again yet to see if it is a solution or if it was just a fluke the first time.

    Either way I'm very curious as to the cause of the problem, but possibly it's just a loose connection to the motherboard or some such, I dunno :confused:.


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