I'm having this same problem with my IBM Thinkpad T30 and Im just wondering if there is there anyway to recover from this error without having to format.

Kings, I found no other way ... doesn't mean there isn't one out there, but my HD was so fried I had no other choice.

I am recieving the same error, but I have been using the CD from the start. Should I go and DL the disks and try it that way? How do you upgrade the driver on the floppy?

Todd, I would DL the 6 XP boot disks from Microsft and try it that way ... they should ensure you have the proper drivers, etc. and then ultimately take you over to the CD. My problem was that the driver for my external CD drive wasn't one of the drivers on the 6 setup disks, so it wouldnt work ... if your CD is an IBM or another very standardized CD, it should.

If not, do what I did: I created by own boot disk, and had it call to the DOS driver for my CD which I found on the web. (You just copy the driver onto the boot floppy and modify the autoexec.bat file to call to that driver ... again, I found instructions somewhere on the web). This gave me a "C:" prompt and a working CD, from which I could then reinstall XP.

I gett the error saying Disk access denied in Win2k. Why this problem. Kindly mail me the soln.

rgds
Prashanth

Hi all,

I'am suffering this "UNMOUNTABLE BOOT DEVICE" (0x00000ed), in a new system i am building.
Any help would be very nice.

First i have to say that only the motherboard and the HD are new. CPU, CD-RW, and memory are 9 month

old, and have been working fine. New Mother: ASUS A7V8X-MX (w/onboard video). HD: WD800BB (80Gb).

When i wanted to install WinXP from cd, i got the error, in different places (tryed several times):
- After formating, when it starts to copy the first files.
- After formating, and copying files, when the first reboot comes.
- (reformated again) 1st reboot ok, but hangs in the screen that says "Installing windows" "39 min

left". Rebooted and got the blue screen with the UMB error.

Went to the store, and asked for a HD check, and they say it work perfectly.
After that, took the disk to my older (9 month old) system. Configured as Single Master on IDE 0.
Booted from cd, and instaled XP perfectly. Rebooted several times, so HD is really Ok.

Took the HD (with WinXP installed), to the new system, using single master. Booted fine! ... At

first. I still get the UMB error 1 in 4 reboots. When it does boot there is no a single sign of

something wrong.

The Microsoft site give 3 posibilities: Memory, bios settings, or cableing. Memory have been

working fine in the older machine. Bios are default, but still checked and HD parameters are

correct, and uses LBA. The cable, is the one that came with the new motherboard.

Using google a bit, someone got it and solved by disconecting its DVD drive (?!). But i have set my

CD-RW on the secondary IDE controller, so i do not suspect of it. Also the older system uses another WD800BB.

I still have to do more testing. I suspect of the new the cable and the board itself. Maybe is

something with the drivers or bios firmware.

Just popped to my mind, both the new and the old boards are almost alike (the older is an ASUS A7V8

X), but the new one comes with ATA133 while the older one comes with ATA100. The HD is ATA100, wich

normaly should not be a problem.

Any sugestions ?

Thanks in advance!
Sergio.

Hi all,
Well finaly my version of the unmountable boot device got solved. It was the damn IDE cable.

One lesson i learned: never buy the components for a new system in different places. Then you wont have to prove who sold the offending part.

[RANT] Just for ranting a bit more. A did suspect of that cable in my earlier tests, so i went and buyed another. Wich did not worked! So that redirected my ideas to wrong paths. Now, what actually bothers me more, is that the cable is not unuseable, it does work in ATA-66. So, maybe there exists 80 pin ATA cables that are manufactured for older ATA transfer rates, but there is no way of telling the diference by looking at them. They all look the same!
[/RANT]

Hope my experience helps another one.
Sergio.

Dear All, I met such case also but not in the installation. I used my PC with WinXP over a year. It works perfectly. However, it turns to blue screen and the error is unmountable boot device. it is amazing to me. Do you have any idea?

oh~ one more clue... before I caught this blue screen, my PC was reboot and reboot several times after the screen of WinXP logo (which has a blue status bar below).

Thanks very much.

I called DELL tech support. They had me boot with the XP OS cd in the drive, then do fixboot, and all is well

Another reason for this fault is the cdrom or DVD drive. Ik did have the same problem when installing a new XP pro and replace the DVD and the problem was fixed.