Hi Guys. I seem to have run into a problem with my RAID 0 Array, so was hoping someone here might be willing to offer some help.

I recently put together a new PC that has two Western Digital 74gig SATA Raptor HDs. I configured these in a RAID 0 Array, created and formatted a Partition, before installing Vista without any problems. Unfortunately, I had issues getting some software to run on Vista; I eventually decided to install XP onto a third hard drive and Dual Boot between that and my existing Vista installation. I installed a Western Digital 80gig IDE Caviar from my old PC and managed to get that working before trying to install XP onto it. I booted from my XP disk and loaded up the SATA drivers so that XP could detect my existing RAID 0 Array; I then formatted the new, IDE drive and started XP installing on it. The XP Installer copied some files across and then had to reboot to continue... This is where the problems started: Instead of continuing with the XP installation, my PC just hung on the Bios boot-up screen. It wouldn't even let me enter the BIOS config screens or anything.

I tried disconnecting my new IDE Drive but my PC still failed to boot, so I reconnected that and disconnected both my SATA HDs that were linked together in RAID 0. This allowed my machine to boot up and XP to continue it's installation onto the new IDE Drive (which now thinks it's drive C being the only HD connected). Something during my XP installation onto my IDE Drive has stopped my RAID 0 Array from working, and the problem even prevents me from having them connected and booting my machine. Because I can't even boot, I'm not sure what options I have now. I'd like to keep the existing data on the RAID 0 Array if I can, but realise that might not be possible.

Here is my full system:
- Intel Core 2 Duo E6850 "LGA775 Conroe" 3.00GHz
- Asus P5K Deluxe WiFi Intel P35 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard
- Crucial Ballistix 2GB (2x1GB) DDR2 PC2-8500C5 1066MHz Dual Channel Kit
- 2 x Western Digital Raptor 74GB WD740ADFD 10,000RPM SATA 16MB
- Western Digital Caviar 80GB WD800JB 7200RPM ATA 8MB
- Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium 64-Bit Edition
- Microsoft Windows XP Professional Edition

Thanks in advance for any replies. I hope someone here knows a little more about this that I do.

~Yan

I had the same probs and found an article in a pc mag that was titled a better way to install vista. It said to install XP first and then install vista because XP uses some different type of boot manager and if you try to install it after vista you will corrupt the vista boot manager no matter if the vista os is on a different HDD or not, even if you disconnect the vista HDD when you install XP, the minute you hook the vista drives back up it will corrupt vista and you will be SoL. Hope that helps ya!

Not to sure about your board if xp detects the raid driver during initial setup but make sure you load the drivers when it asks you or the raid will also crash,... go figure right!

On a sorta different note is there any performance advantage in using a 64bit vista or xp over their 32bit brethern?

Hi duntuatha. Thanks for the reply, though I think what you are talking about is a different issue. I already knew that installing XP would effect Vista's Boot manager, but the guide I read said that I could just use the Vista install CD to repair this problem. My current issue is that my PC is hanging before it even tries to load Windows.

Bah. It looks like one of my drives might be faulty. They both show up in the BIOS, but Windows Installation will only detects one of them. I've tried with only one HD connected at a time and this backs that up. I'm not sure if doing what I did could have directly caused this, though it does seem odd. I'll have to try sending it back and seeing if I can get a replacement.