Disk Management - Disk x Number Assignment

[Mootiwan]

Greetings,

I have a problem where a ZIP 250 is assuming the role of Disk 0 instead of my WDC hard drive.

I have an Intel D865PERL motherboard, a SATA hard drive and an internal ZIP Atapi drive. The configuration (according to the system BIOS) is as such:

SATA Port 0 - WDC WD1200JD hard drive
SATA Port 1 - Not Detected

PATA Primary Master - Plextor CD-R PX-W4824
PATA Primary Slave - Not Detected

PATA Secondary Master - IOMEGA ZIP 250
PATA Secondary Slave - Not Detected

The trouble is, according to Disk Management, the ZIP drive has placed itself as Disk 0, the WDC hard drive as Disk 1 and the Plextor CD-R as CDROM 0. Now, this wouldn't normally be a problem as the OS loads and all works well. It's just that I'm trying to install software that seeks out Disk 0 on which to place itself. When it sees that the storage device (ZIP 250) isn't a typical hard drive, it fails the installation process. According to the Disk Management screen, the devices are listed as such:

Disk 0
Removable (D: )
No Media

Disk 1
Basic Windows (C: )
111.79GB 111.79GB NTFS
Online Healthy (System)

CDRom 0
CDRom (E: )
Online

The drive letter scheme is just fine, so no changes to them are necessary, but I'd like to change the Disk number assignment. I've unhooked the ZIP, booted, verified that the WDC moved up into the role of Disk 0, powered down, hooked up the ZIP, rebooted and was amazed to see the ZIP grabbed Disk 0 again. I've set the ZIP as PATA Secondary Slave, but it still assumes the Disk 0 position.

I've searched around for a solution but most inquiries are about changing drive letters, not Disk assignments.

Can anyone out there lend a hand on this one?

Thanks in advance.

Moot

 

[bcastner]

I really think the sanest resolution is to contact the software authors and get a different installation routine.

 

[Mootiwan]

We are the software manufacturer!

But I need to know why certain devices grab the Disk 0 slot in lieu of the typical hard drive. This will come in handy should our cutomers' systems are configured the same.

 

[bcastner]

Why are you polling the device enumeration during installation?

In any case, the enumeration of PnP devices during the NTDETECT phase differs greatly between NT, Win2k, and the XP & Windows 2003 process.

Under Win2k the enumeration would be for the IDE devices, IDE0 then IDE1, then other ATAPI devices, SCSI and so forth. The Iomega device on the IDE bus is going to be enumerated prior to any other bus device.

You may find some relief in the way XP and Windows 2003 handles the enumeration. I happen to find it slightly bizarre, but this is how it is done (Quoting MS):

"When you install Windows Server 2003 or Windows XP on a computer that has two hard disks, where one hard disk is configured as master on the primary integrated device electronics (IDE) channel and where the other hard disk is configured as master on the secondary IDE channel, by default, Setup may assign the logical drive C to the hard disk that is configured as master on the secondary IDE channel. This is a change from the behavior in Windows 2000. When you install Windows 2000 on computer that uses the same hard disk configuration, Windows 2000 Setup tends to assign the logical drive C to the hard disk that is configured as master on the primary IDE channel.

The PNP algorithms that are used by Windows Server 2003 and Windows XP for PNP enumeration are optimized by using an in-place reorder mechanism. The last item that is detected can be listed first. As a result, when you run Windows Server 2003 Setup or Windows XP Setup on a computer with two hard disk controllers, where each hard disk is configured as master, Setup can list the hard disk that is configured as master on the secondary controller first in the list of available hard disk drives for the installation of the operating system to that hard disk.

This behavior can occur on computers that are running Windows Server 2003, Windows XP, and earlier versions of Windows. PNP enumeration and the order of the hard disks that Setup detects is not guaranteed. Note the following considerations that apply to the differences in PNP enumeration behavior in Windows 2000, Windows Server 2003, and Windows XP:
In Windows 2000, PnP processes its array of requests and moves the hard disk drives that it is going to start first to a separate array.
Windows Server 2003 and Windows XP perform an in-place reorder operation to optimize PnP. As a result of the reorder operation, Windows Server 2003 and Windows XP may enumerate the hard disk on the secondary IDE channel before the hard disk on the primary IDE channel. The hard disk that Setup detects last is listed first.

The PNP enumeration behavior in Windows Server 2003 and Windows XP applies to the whole operating system and is not limited to computers with two hard disk controllers, as described in the example earlier in this article. For example, this behavior can occur on computers that have multiple logical disks on one Small Computer System Interface (SCSI) hard disk controller or on computers that have multiple network adapters that use the same driver."