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 Post subject: Not a clue what to do...
PostPosted: Sun Jan 11, 2015 1:52 pm 
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So I built my own server in 2013 using Windows home server 2011 and it's been running completely fine for nearly 2 years until today...

last night was fine as I watched a film on it and today I came to look and noticed it wasn't on the network. Switched the monitor on to find:

"Reboot and Select proper Boot device or Insert boot media in selected boot device and press a key"

Now things have gone from bad to worse as i cannot for the life of me find the bloody server install disc! I have looked high and low in my apartment (what's worse is I KNOW only a few weeks ago I saw it and thought Ah i might need that one day) so now I have no idea what I'm meant to do :/

Please if anyone can help I'd be very appreciative.

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PostPosted: Tue Jan 13, 2015 6:04 am 
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That's a bummer. One thing you could try doing is pulling the system drive out and connecting it to another computer and run a CHKDSK on it to see if it can correct issues the system drive may have and see if it will at least resolve your boot issues.

If not an you happen to find your Server Install Disk then hopefully you configured an OS Backup Drive to recover from since it will make it a lot easier to restore the server otherwise its a new installation,

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PostPosted: Wed Jan 14, 2015 6:41 am 
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Well it seems like lady luck is on my side... I switched the server on to give it one last shot and it's booted up fine!

is there anything you could recommend in case this does happen again?

You can't seem to be able to buy WHS 2011 anywhere at the moment other than super inflated prices on eBay. I jsut don't want it to fail again and be in jeopardy of loosing everything on it.


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PostPosted: Thu Jan 15, 2015 10:38 am 
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All you need to do is find someone near you who also runs WHS2011 if they would be kind enough to make a copy of the WHS2011 Server Install and Client Recovery Disks. Hopefully you placed the COA Key Sticker on the Server and as a second precaution made a note for the key so you could easily enter it again when prompted.

The real question here that needs to be answered is why you encountered the issue in the first place. After rereading your original post and thinking a bit your issue may simply be within the BIOS Boot order Setting. I had a motherboard a while back that for some odd reason would just change its boot order then along the way it sort of self corrected. Thing here was the boot drive was always seen by the BIOS but possibly could there of been a lag with the boot drive showing up. I never figured this out and once the problem went away I just never gave it any additional thought until now.

I would find those disks or obtain a copy of the missing disks and hopefully you have the COA Key. There maybe a way to look at the COA Key from the server but this I am uncertain of but if you can figure that out then it will save you a lot of grief.

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PostPosted: Thu Jan 15, 2015 11:14 am 
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I had lost my product key *annoying* but someone has written a code that extracts it from the Registry so I've now recovered the key!

I just need to get a copy of the discs... which might be a little trickier as I know no one who has one where I am.


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PostPosted: Thu Jan 15, 2015 11:36 am 
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If you registered your software with Microsoft you could try contacting them to see if they will issue you a new set of disks.

I suggest you make ISO copies of all your installation software and archive them in 2 or more places.

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PostPosted: Mon Jan 19, 2015 9:51 am 
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Something I've found very odd...not sure why this happens. But both my EX487 and EX490 exhibit the same "feature."

If I make any changes to USB storage devices (add or remove), including both hard drives and flash drives, then the MediaSmart Server BIOS decides to change the boot order on me. More often than not this will occur only if there is still at least one USB storage device connected (there inevitably is). The fix is to go into the BIOS and visit the Boot Menu.

A USB device will always be in the top spot, even if it's not in the bottom USB port, so I'll get the same error as you or something like NTLDR was not found. The fix is to put the #0 drive back into the first spot, save the settings and reboot.

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HP EX490, 4GB, E5300, 15TB - Server 2012 - Sharing and Streaming
HP EX487, 4GB, E5300, 13TB - Server 2012 Essentials - Backups


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PostPosted: Mon Jan 19, 2015 10:55 am 
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That's interesting and something I have never noticed but I will have to play with to see if I see the same thing. I do know that on the EX48x Series the BIOS does have a tendency to change its boot order but in this case its always to the on board USB SMI which can be corrected with 2 changes to the BIOS to disable the SMI

My EX48x is still running the Stock BIOS so I am curious if the modified BIOS from the EX49x maybe in part the root cause and if so then why but then again I will not know until I plug in a USB Device into my EX48x which is running WHS2011. I only have one EX49x running but its running WHSv1.

I will run over to them and see what if I see the same things as your seeing Matt and get back to you very soon.

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PostPosted: Mon Jan 19, 2015 11:59 am 
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Matt,

I tried to replicate the issue you posted on my EX48x which is running the Stock BIOS from HP. This server is running WHS2011 has 2GB RAM, an E5200 SLY7 CPU and has the LED Software and INTEL RST Drivers Installed.

I used a 1TB USB WD Passport Drive to perform the test. I plugged it into the Front and Rear USB Ports. I connected the drive and had WHS remove the drive and rebooted without issue and then I tried leaving the drive connected without having WHS remove the drive and each time my server booted normally.

Correct me if I am wrong on this but your EX48x has the modified BIOS using the EX49x BIOS Mods and it may something to do with that but I am not sure.

I did not bother to test this on the EX49x because its a totally stock unit running the HP Installed version of WHS and there are no reported issues there with the USB devices. What if anything maybe different on your EX49x then what was shipped from HP?

I am not a BIOS Expert here but the only difference I can see between our EX48x might be the version of BIOS being run and possibly you might be running WS2012.

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~ AMD Phenom II X4 995 3.2 GHz
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