Hi all,

Here's hoping someone can help me please.

I have a Samsung R505 laptop that was brought to me for a simple Windows reinstall, I was even supplied with the original recovery media (always a bonus). The problem I am having is that after completing the Vista installation, which runs with no errors and goes to the desktop, and then rebooting the laptop, it will not boot without the Vista DISC in the DVD Drive. I have tried several HDD's, different CD Drive, different versions of Windows (original Vista and tried installing Win 7 and get exactly same result.), BIOS updates, swap tested RAM, nothing makes any difference, it will only boot to Windows if i leave the Vista, or other bootable disc, in the drive and ignore the 'Press any key to boot from CD' message. If the disc is ejected when the prompt is on screen, it will continue to boot normally, but will not boot if the disc is not in the drive when the laptop is 1st powered on.

There are no OPTIONS to change any relevant settings in BIOS. I have been repairing laptops for over 10 years and this is by far the biggest challenge to date.

If anyone else out there has any other ideas i would gladly try them, having exhausted everything i can think of.

Many thanks in advance.

TonyGood afternoon Saxon2012

Go into the bios and make sure the 1st boot device is the HD and then look and see if "network / pxe" booting is enabled if it is disable the PXE booting this will not disable the network devices it just will stop it from network booting.

Maybe the simple windows install was the reason of why you got it and there is a underlying issue that you were not made of.

If there is an OPTION for "booting from other devices"like e-sata. If they are there just disabling them also.

When you are booting is there any usb / Bluetooth devices plugged in.

Another thought is there any cards in the card reader?

If I can think of anything else I will let you know, Mike

So you are sure the mbr is correct (you've run fixboot and fixmbr?) and hd is first device in the bios boot order (I know it shouldn't matter, but given the circumstances of this problem......)?Vista Repair Install...Thanks for the responses guys,

However, none of the suggestions work. I have tried all of them before i resorted to asking for help (i hate being beat by a machine )

It has had 3 different HDD's fitted, so i can rule out a physical failure there, or even mbr issues. PXE boot is disabled by default, no eSata, no 'external' devices plugged in, even removed the DVD drive so there is only 1 physical device it can boot from, still fails.

Completely stumped and about to admit defeat

TonyModify the Boot Configuration Data (BCD) with BCDEdit.exe or Easy BCD.
Bootloader must be missing from HD.
http://neosmart.net/EasyBCD/

I suspect that you did not use the Recovery Partition & the recovery media corrupted the System Partition. Vista & Win7 do not have a boot.ini like XP had. They also have a System, Boot, (likely a Recovery), & Tools (maybe) Partitions.

[year+ old attachment deleted by admin]3 HDD's...probably part of the issue here...
Remove all but the Vista HDD and run the repair i linked to above....re-boot after.Quote from: patio on July 31, 2012, 07:15:05 PM

3 HDD's...probably part of the issue here...
Remove all but the Vista HDD and run the repair i linked to above....re-boot after.