2nd HD with Vista

[Moose]

I had Vista installed on a 80GB HD, I then added a 500GB HD and installed Vista on it, meaning vista is on both HDs. On boot it asks me to select which one to use. However if I remove my first HD I can boot the Vista on the second. I think this is to do with the boot files being on the 1st HD. Is there anyway to fix this without reinstalling windows on the 2nd HD again without the first HD connected?

[Snipe343]

What's the problem? If its you cant boot into 2nd one when you have vista on the first theres boot options somewhere in vista i forget where though

[Cold Storm]

Whenever you install another hdd you don't have to install another os. All you have to do is format hdd that you don't want vista on with ether SolarisDVD or UBCD and then you'll use the one hdd as a boot drive and the other as storage. Only time that you want to put another os on a different hdd is if you are going to duel boot xp to vista or lepord.

[Moose]

I think you misunderstood me, I have vista installed on both hard drives and both Vistas work. But if i remove the first hard drive, I cannot use the vista on the second hard drive. Basically I dont want 2 HDs I want the 500GB one but when I remove the 80GB one i cant use the vista on the 500Gb one.

[Cold Storm]

All right, hows Bios showing you on the hdds? It could be the fact that your using a Sata 3.0 hdd on a board that is 1.5... Or the fact that you need to work with bios so it will see the 500gb hdd as the boot drive.

[kylew]

Hey Moose, I had this problem a few weeks back, the way to sort it, and allow vista to boot off the second HDD, you need to go to control panel > system > Advanced System Settings > the advanced tab there, then at the bottom of the advanced tab there will be startup and recovery, go to settings and change the default opperating system to the second one on the drop down menu :).

[Moose]

Thank you for your replies, none solve the problem due to misunderstandings :-), kylew, the vista on the second HD is already the default, but it only starts when the old HD is present.

I think however I've found someone here (http://forums.techpowerup.com/showthread.php?t=60970) who has the same problem and so I'll use their solution, you'll probably be able to understand their wording of the problem better!