Skip to main content
Start a Conversation

Unsolved

This post is more than 5 years old

CBT22

4 Posts

106880

January 6th, 2005 13:00

PowerEdge 2850 Can't Boot From CD

Specs:

PowerEdge 2850 Rack
3.0 Ghx Xeon
2GB DDR2 RAM
146 GB SCSI
Embedded RAID - PERC4
1.44MB Floppy Drive
24X IDE CD-RW/DVD ROM

This is a new system. Originally, the system booted the OpenManage Server Assistant CD without a problem. During installation of Windows Server 2003, the system hung and I rebooted. I received a message that "NTLDR" could not be found, so I wiped the RAID drives to start over again. Now the system will not boot from the CD.

The System Setup shows the following under Boot Sequence:

1. Embedded VIRTUALCDROM DRIVE
2. Embedded VIRTUALFLOPPY DRIVE
3. Diskette Drive A:
4. IDE CD-ROM device

All have checkmarks by them.

Under Integrated Devices, the IDE-CDROM Controller is set to Auto.

The system will boot to the floppy drive, and the CD-ROM will flash during bootup, but it will not boot the Server Assitant CD. Is there any other things I could try? I hope I haven't completely hosed the system! Thanks for any advice.

barhampa

718 Posts

January 8th, 2005 22:00

I wouldn't be to concerned if it is still under warranty. As a confirmation that you have a faulty CD drive, download the Dell 32bit diagnostics
from the Dell Web site. Create the floppy disks and boot up from #1.
Then run the CD tests.
You could always try to reseat the cable first.

barhampa

718 Posts

January 15th, 2005 08:00

If you have the system utility installed you could always run the diagnostics from there. on boot.

jonville

62 Posts

January 21st, 2005 04:00

I would disable the the virtual items or put the CD-ROM drive first in the boot order.  If the CD-ROM is in the boot seq. then the drive is detected in BIOS.
 
Have you tried booting directly to the Windows 2003 disc?  It should be bootable and it would be a good check to see if this issue is media related.
 
I would also look under the hood to make sure there is nothing putting preasure on the top of the drive.
 
The diags should tell you if the drive can read media
 
Let me know how it turns out.

CBT22

4 Posts

January 21st, 2005 11:00

Thanks, all. I was able to boot from an external USB CD drive, so I will have Dell send a replacement drive.

jonville

62 Posts

January 22nd, 2005 13:00

CBT22,
Let us know if the replacement drive fixes the problem.  I could be a bad CD drive or some wierd BIOS state causing this problem.  Were you able to check if the drive can read media using the Dell Diagnostics?

bencrowe

1 Message

June 23rd, 2005 20:00

I am having the same issue, but I have the DVD/ CDRW drive. It will not read CDRs. We lost our Server2003 media CD and are attempting to install from a cd backup copy. You need original media for this drive!

Any ideas on firmware for this drive? The CDR copy works great on all of our other servers.

Was this post helpful?

View All

Top