I was playing around with this in 'look and see' mode on my kid's computer, just to see if it would boot and what options were available.

 

In devices I set disk1 device as the only available HDD. I started the service, but thats as far as I got... I never told it to format.

 

Now without the flash drive the PC won't boot anymore. It won't get past 'Verifying DMI Pool Data...'

 

Did I irrevocably screw my windows install, or is there some little fix to get it back to normal?

 

(If it is screwed up, I accept that it's my fault, I'm just hoping against hope  )

First Step: Check to see if your hard disk is still selected as the boot device in your PC's bios.  It might still be set to boot from the USB device.

 

If you did not start the unRaid array, which would then proceed to clear and format your hard disk, the odds are good you did nothing really terrible.

 

Report back and let us know how you do.

 

Joe l.

It's possible the MBR (master boot record) got overwritten on your disk.  If you only had a single disk partition before, then probably can be recovered.

I doubt if anything is lost.  Go through all of the BIOS items related to the drive (not just the boot order) and echo those back to us.

 

 

Bill

Well, the drive is still recognized and selected in the BIOS. I removed the USB-HDD from the boot order. I didn't see anything else in the BIOS settings that might help (or hurt.)

 

I DID start the array, but did not initiate the format, which appeared to be a separate step.

 

The puzzling thing to me is why it won't go past the 'Verifying DMI Pool Data' line. I would think it would pass that and say no boot device, or something to that effect.

 

So, if I want to try fixing the MBR, what should I do?

 

Also, I do have a working Bart PE disk, if that can help me.

You didn't accidently assign the disk to PARITY (top slot) instead of DISK1 (2nd slot)?  If you did this you really do have a major headache!

 

If you are going to assign a drive to a disk slot to look around or diagnose a problem, use the bottom slot and NOT the top one!  Starting the array with a single drive in the parity slot will start the writing of binary 1s to the drive at high speed!

I didn't assign it to parity (although I might have, if it had let me, but luckily that wasn't possible)

 

Any other thoughts?

 

And btw, let me just say that this forum has a nice vibe, with helpful people being cool. Not like some forums where they expect you to already know the answer before you post.

 

Congrats on that!

And btw, let me just say that this forum has a nice vibe, with helpful people being cool. Not like some forums where they expect you to already know the answer before you post.

 

Congrats on that!

Perhaps the other boards give too much weight to your choice of handles. 

 

 

Bill