[skrilla]

So I just got the ASUS P5Q Premium mobo, which is great, but I have 2 hard drives (one new SATA drive and an older IDE drive).

my XP install is on the IDE drive, and I (so far) use the SATA for additional storage. Not a big deal, however, when I boot, it won't recognize my IDE HDD if my SATA is plugged in. So I went into the BIOS to look at my boot device priority, and my options are floppy drive, Hard Drive, CD-ROM or disabled. If I have my SATA drive plugged in, i cant tell it to use my IDE drive for boot. I can't even find out where to tell it to do so. I have disabled the floppy drive option in the main BIOS screen (i have no floppy drive...) however it still shows up in the boot device priority screen.

Long story short, is there a way to have both of my HDDs plugged in and tell it to use my IDE as the primary? Surely it must be possible, I just can't figure out how its done.

Thanks!

[MorphiusFaydal]

Usually, you can hit "enter" on the HDD, and it'll list all plugged in hard drives, and you can specify an order.

At least; that's how it's worked for me on the last two boards I've had.

And the FDD is still going to show in the boot priority, even if you don't have one connected. Just the way that AMI or Pheonix programs the BIOS.

[skrilla]

interesting! many thanks, ill get to it.

[no2pencil]

While it isn't a good method for consistent use, but you could hook up your IDE drive to a USB adapter & boot off USB. It will at least get you booted with both drives to do what you need to get done.