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    ACER 3680 Boot From USB

    Discussion in 'Acer' started by JagsFan, Sep 22, 2008.

  1. JagsFan

    JagsFan Newbie

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    I am working on an Acer 3680 Laptop for my son.

    The internal IDE port got fried and cannot be recognized by the laptop so I came up with the bright idea of installing an OS on a USB drive and booting from that.

    Good idea, in theory but in actual practice? Not so much..

    XP appears to be the only OS that will install onto an external drive. But, when booting with XP, I get a BSOD..

    VISTA won't install to a USB drive so I installed VISTA on the external drive using a workstation, but then when I tried to boot up with the laptop, it got the solid B/W bar at the bottom and just sat there.

    Is there any option to boot an ACER 3680 with an xternal drive?? Or is this laptop now useless??

    Thanx in advance..
     
    JagsFan, Sep 22, 2008
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  2. Andy

    Andy Notebook Prophet

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    Are the external HDDs detected in the Boot Order in the BIOS ?
     
    Andy, Sep 22, 2008
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  3. JagsFan

    JagsFan Newbie

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    Thanx for the reply.

    Yes.. And I have it set to boot from the CD/DVD Drive then from the External and I also pulled the Internal out of the boot order.
     
    JagsFan, Sep 22, 2008
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  4. Andy

    Andy Notebook Prophet

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    Do you get the BSOD with the STOP code 0x00000007B INACCESSIBLE_BOOT_DEVICE ??
     
    Andy, Sep 22, 2008
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  5. JagsFan

    JagsFan Newbie

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    Give me a few minutes.

    I'll check that..
     
    JagsFan, Sep 22, 2008
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  6. JagsFan

    JagsFan Newbie

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    The only info is this:


    TECHNICAL INFORMATION:

    0x0000007B (0xF78A6528, 0xC0000034, 0x00000000, 0x00000000)
     
    JagsFan, Sep 22, 2008
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  7. Andy

    Andy Notebook Prophet

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    When windows xp boots, it reinitializes all USB devices. When doing so, all usb devices are momentarily disabled and turned off. When this happens, windows loses access to the drive it is installed on, and crashes.

    It is entirely possible to install windows on a usb hard drive, or a normal hard drive in a usb enclosure. You just can't boot windows from it. :eek:

    The error that you get is STOP: 0x0000007B (0xF78A6528, 0xC0000034, 0x00000000, 0x00000000)
    INACCESSIBLE_BOOT_DEVICE http://support.microsoft.com/kb/324103/en-us

    BTW how do you know your IDE port is fried. Does the BIOS give any beep codes ? Have you tried different HDDs ?
     
    Andy, Sep 22, 2008
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  8. JagsFan

    JagsFan Newbie

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    Thanx for the info. At least I won't be banging my head against the wall trying to do something that can't be done.



    When the laptop boots, the internal drive is not seen at all, either at boot up or in the BIOS. Several drives have been tried, all with the same result. The original drive that was in there got fried somehow and, since any new drive is not seen at all, I assumed that the interfaced got torched as well.

    So, I have an expensive doorstop here, eh? :(
     
    JagsFan, Sep 22, 2008
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  9. Andy

    Andy Notebook Prophet

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    Andy, Sep 22, 2008
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  10. JagsFan

    JagsFan Newbie

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    I am in NE Florida..

    What would you be looking for that MB?
     
    JagsFan, Sep 22, 2008
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  11. Andy

    Andy Notebook Prophet

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    You can check out this motherboard, since you're in the US.

    I live in the UK, and I am looking for $130 + shipping. My mobo works fine AFAIK, it has the wifi card installed (Atheros mini PCI-E), but the only problem is that the headphone jack stops working after an hour's usage. I dunno till date what was/is the cause, probably heat from the wifi card, but I had a PCMCIA 7.1 sound card, so I never bothered about it. :)

    BTW which CPU have you got ?
     
    Andy, Sep 22, 2008
    #11