Share via

How to change Boot order in BIOS?

Anonymous
2012-05-06T23:41:55+00:00

I have a Gateway computer. I just recently purchased a WD My Book Essential external hard drive. It took me a while to change the bios setting to get the computer to boot with the external connected.

WD has maintained that the hard drive 'C' should be the first item for the system to look for, Right now it is third. I have gone into the BIOS and highlighted the 'C' drive but i can not figure out how to move it to the top of the list.

I have gone into the boot menu as well and have the same problem, how to move the 'C' drive to the top of the list.

If anyone can help me out i would surely appreciated it.

genedm

Windows for home | Previous Windows versions | Devices and drivers

Locked Question. This question was migrated from the Microsoft Support Community. You can vote on whether it's helpful, but you can't add comments or replies or follow the question.

0 comments

Answer accepted by question author

LemP 74,940 Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
2012-05-13T14:52:38+00:00

First, "you" here is just a bunch of volunteers with varying degrees of knowledge and expertise -- we're not Microsoft.

The "IBA GE SLOT" is the option to boot over the network.  This should be last for most people.

You don't really need WD's SmartWare.  This is an automated backup solution.  Once you have completed the initial backup, SmartWare runs in the background automatically updating your backup as you change files on your main hard drive.  It's a nice thing to have, but if it isn't working, you can do backups manually (or in a variety of other ways).  The important thing is to actually do the backups however you eventually choose to do them. 

I don't know anything about SmartWare so I can't advise you with respect to it other than to suggest that you look in the Event Viewer's (Start > Run > eventvwr > OK) Application Log for any errors that have come from SmartWare.  If you find something, that might help you -- or WD support -- figure out what's going on.

I wouldn't worry too much about a 30-second delay between the Windows splash screen and getting to your desktop.  Now that you mention it, I sometimes experience a subjectively long delay, but I never associated it with the My Book -- perhaps it is related.

Was this answer helpful?

0 comments

10 additional answers

Sort by: Most helpful
Most helpful Newest Oldest
  1. Anonymous
    2012-05-07T02:45:55+00:00

    On my Gateway (and yours may be different), there's a Help menu on the right side of each BIOS screen. On the Boot screen in BIOS, arrow down to your HDD, then press the "+" sign to move it up in the number one position, if that's where it needs to be. Once you are done, press F10 to save and exit.

    SC Tom

    Was this answer helpful?

    1 person found this answer helpful.
    0 comments
  2. LemP 74,940 Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
    2012-05-08T17:58:14+00:00

    It took me a while to change the bios setting to get the computer to boot with the external connected.

    Odd.  Normally you shouldn't have to deal with the BIOS at all when connecting an external drive.

    WD has maintained that the hard drive 'C' should be the first item for the system to look for, Right now it is third.

    That's surprising advice from WD.  Were you having a problem booting with the external drive connected?

    It's quite common for the hard drive to be the third boot device (after the floppy drive and the CD drive) because that enables you to boot from one of those devices.  Otherwise, you have to go into the BIOS and change the order anytime you want to boot from a floppy or CD.

    On my rather ancient Gateway, I'm offered only 3 choices of boot devices: removable device, hard drive, or ATAPI CD drive.  Interestingly, the sub-menu for "removable device" only lists the floppy drive (even though there's a separate "enable boot from USB" setting -- perhaps that's the reason I've never been able to get this machine to boot from a USB flash drive).  And even more interestingly, the sub-menu for hard drive includes my two internal IDE hard drives AND my external USB-connected Western Digital My Book.

    Perhaps what WD means is that the C drive must be first in the list of "hard drives."

    BIOS menu screens are not standardized and yours likely is different than mine.  In this one --> http://www.pchell.com/images/bootdevicepriority.jpg you can see that "First Boot Device" is configured to be "Hard Drive" but if you were to go down to the entry "Hard Drive Boot Priority" you would see a list of all the hard drives recognized by the BIOS. 

    You definitely need to have your C drive (where Windows is located) set as the first hard drive to boot from, regardless of the order in which the BIOS picks its type of boot device from among hard drives, floppy drives, and CD drives.

    ***************************************

    Later ...

    ****************************************

    Here's another possibility:  some WD drives now come with pre-installed "virtual CD" partitions.  If you have the BIOS boot device set to boot from CD first (which, as I said above, used to be the norm), AND you have one of these U3 virtual CDs pre-installed on your My Book, the BIOS may well attempt to boot from it ... which, of course, will not work.  See http://www.dedoimedo.com/computers/passport-vcd.html

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments
  3. Anonymous
    2012-05-08T16:57:28+00:00

    ?? I never said anything about "entering setup". Now I'm confused :-)

    SC Tom

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments
  4. Anonymous
    2012-05-08T14:16:12+00:00

    I was able to move the HHD to the first position but i do not understand what you mean by entering setup

    genedm

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments