Dell XPS 8100: No boot device available

You can run the Dell Diagnostics from the Recover Partition or from the Utilities and Drivers disk.  On boot press F12 and select Run Diagnostics if it appears otherwise boot from the Utilities and Drivers disk and Run Diagnostics.  Also the first thing I would replace it the CMOS battery.  It can sometimes cause this issue.  It's a coin sized battery inside the computer and is a CR2032 and can be found at any drug store or Walmart.

Hi Bill,

First, make sure your important files are backed up!

I would run the diagnostics from your drivers and utilities disc, not the F12 partition.

I'll try replacing the CMOS battery and see what that does.

The problem with no XPS 8100 not booting if a Firewire drive is plugged in has been happening since the early days of my owning this PC. If I forget to remove the Fireware drive before booting, my PC hangs at the "Starting Windows" logo.

BSODs have been increasing in frequency.

The message that says "no boot device available" (which is really scary as well as problematic) just started yesterday. Fortunately, I can still eventually get my PC to boot if I keep trying.

--Bill

Bill, have you checked boot devices to make sure that firewire drive is not on the list?

The BSOD may or may not be related to a hardware problem. Can you tell me what it is?

I looked at my BIOS settings and found almost all of my external hard drives and the CD drive listed as boot devices. I removed them all. When I did, I continued to get two problems:

On the first reboot, with the Firerwire drive plugged in, the boot hung at the Windows logo point.

On the second reboot, with the Firewire drive not plugged in, I saw that very scary "No boot device found" message again. I was able to reboot on the third try this time. On other occasions, it's taken five or more presses of the power button to boot.

I haven't replaced the CMOS battery yet -- I purchased the XPS 8100 in February and my computer's clock has been keeping fine time.

The two most recent BSOD error messages where STOP: 0x0000007E and IRQL_Not_Less_OR_EQUAL...STOP: 0x0000000A

I've checked the XPS' internal temperature several times and that's within the normal range.

I appreciate any help.

--Bill

I had two more BSODs today. The first was STOP: 0x00000024...ntfs.sys, and the second was STOP: 0x0000003B...win32k.sys.

The boot problems persist: I never get past the Windows logon screen if the Firewire port is used. Sometimes I need to remove all USB devices in order to be able to boot. And sometimes, still, I get the "No boot drive" found error.

This is on my Dell XPS 8100. I have Windows 7 Home Premium, and the system was purchased in February 2011.

--Bill

The battery is not a likely suspect with a system this new. I really think you have a pending hard drive failure.

When you ran the diagnostics, did you test just the hard drive?

Ok- I know this seems too simple, but please try this:  Open your case and (with power off of course), check every single connector and plug from every device to and from the mainboard.  Press lightly but firmly (and make sure you constantly tap the case and something else grounded, or wear a anti-static strap), and make certain that all plugs are seated and fully plugged in.

On a different system that I had about a year ago, I had a very similar problem to what you are describing.  It turns out that one of the connectors to the mobo was only plugged in about 1/2 way, and it was causing the boot device error to appear and reappear.  It was driving me crazy.

Sorry if this isn't your problem, but it's worth a try.  Sometimes during shipping the Fedex guy bumps it around and knocks a plug out that wasn't fully seated.

I've run diagnostics several times now. The hard drive passes all the tests, but hangs on the extended SMART test. I've aborted the test after 5 hours twice.  I'm still getting random BSODs and it's still taking 3 - 5 times to reboot my computer. 

-Bill

Bill,

I think you need a new hard drive. Another idea would be to run the drive manufacturer's test, but you must run it from a bootable flash drive or CD.

I also have an XPS 8100. It's a fine machine and I consider myself quite fortunate to have gotten one that's been completely trouble free thus far.

I solved this very vexing problem. The USB keyboard and/or the mouse was the issue. For two weeks, ever since replacing the mouse and keyboard, I've had a trouble-free PC (save for the usual Windows problems.) These were not the original Dell USB keyboard and mouse.

I had removed all my USB devices during reboots, save for the mouse and keyboard. I decided to try replacing those, just on a whim, and that seems to be the fix. I don't know if it was the mouse or keyboard; I replaced both.

I've had USB devices cause reboot blockages in the past, but never have I had a mouse or keyboard be a problem.

--Bill

Hi Bill,

Wow, that's pretty odd, but alls well that ends well.

I too have been experiencing the sporadic won't boot Sata error and sometimes have to restart several times before Windows loads.  Not a good rhyme or reason.  Fully uptodate on Win7 SP, checked internal connections, changed Keyboard and Mouse (USB versions), have not tried clock battery as yet.  Has anyone else experienced this as well with Dell Studio XPS 8100 (8GB) system?  I too am worried about potential HD failure or Problem ATI Video card or something.  Only once did I get a 3 beep code which manual suggests a motherboard or chipset failure, but this has only happened once.  Weird thing is this system ran perfectly well for ~2.5 years but now is progressively getting weird over the past 3 months..  The only other thing that happened that really messed with Win7 stability a few weeks ago, is someone (not mentioning names) downloaded and installed Google Chrome and the system got very weird and unstable until I cleaned it off and went back to standard explorer 9 browser.  The Google Chrome issue seems to be real as there are thousands of posts on weird system things happen when running it, so its gone now and Windows is generally stable except in some cases when (I think) it goes into a long-term power saving mode - - and in some of these cases hard crashes and then is difficult to boot again...  I still think I have some bad piece of hardware though all bootable diagnostics F12 report nothing in terms of Motherboard, RAM, HD, etc...  Some suggest running diagnostics from a bootable flash drive or the Driver / Diagnostics disk, but I don't understand why that might behave differently?  If anyone else has experience with this or new clues as to have to trouble-shoot or diagnose short of bringing it into the Microcenter, I would greatly appreciate suggestions.. Thanks, Doug

Hi Doug,

"Progressively worse" would be a potential hard drive symptom, so I would definitely run the diagnostics from a bootable flash drive or CD. SeaTools is a very good utility for this purpose, but the Dell diagnostics should also be able to pick up any problems.