Accessing old IDE hard drive

[canadaboy25]

Hello I have an old computer which got infected with malware..... and will only boot in safe mode with command prompt. I am not able to access a usb stick because it says does not have a recognized file system, I cannot use floppy dive because i have no computer to read floppies, and the disc drive just sits there blinking.

So I tried plugging the hard drive in to my good realitively new pc IDE port (unplugging my disc drive) with my good two hard drives plugged into the SATA ports. I booted it up and it tried booting from the infected hard drive even with the drive set to slave.

My main question is can i plug my hard drive into my pc while it is running or will that kill something?

Thanks for any help

canadaboy25

[pfrcom]

Re: Accessing old IDE hard drive

My main question is can i plug my hard drive into my pc while it is running or will that kill something?

If it's an IDE drive, strong probability it will kill something

[shadow]

Re: Accessing old IDE hard drive

IDE drives are generally not plug and play devices. So even if nothing gets killed when hot-plugging it in. It probably won't get recognised.

Edit: I think I remember years and years ago you could get IDE rack's, so you could pull hard drives in and out of a PC from the front with a handle. Can't remember if these were hot-pluggable or not. Perhaps IDE can be hot-plugged if ACPI is enabled in the BIOS? I would not try it regardless.

[Uniballer]

Re: Accessing old IDE hard drive

When I have to read an IDE drive on a newer computer I put the drive in a case with a USB 2 adapter and then you can just plug it in. Never had any problems that way.

[pfrcom]

Re: Accessing old IDE hard drive

OP needs to get into BIOS settings, to change priority so SATA drive with boot source is first to boot, when IDE drive is connected

[shadow]

Re: Accessing old IDE hard drive

When I have to read an IDE drive on a newer computer I put the drive in a case with a USB 2 adapter and then you can just plug it in. Never had any problems that way.

Good point. Particularly how nearly every PC omits the IDE port now.

OP needs to get into BIOS settings, to change priority so SATA drive with boot source is first to boot, when IDE drive is connected

Yep.

[canadaboy25]

Re: Accessing old IDE hard drive

Thanks for all of the insight guys! You stopped me from totalling my hard drive.

I set the BIOS to Main RAID at first boot then plugged in my IDE drive in and the computer booted itself normally. I coppied the antimalware files onto the hard drive sucessfully.

I booted my infected computer with the hard drive in safe mode with command prompt and executed the anti malware installer a nice GUI popped up and installed the program.

At the moment I am scanning the drive for viruses and it has found 6 threats.

Are viruses usually in .dll files because thats where it found them?

Thanks a lot

canadaboy25

[goontron]

Re: Accessing old IDE hard drive

Thanks for all of the insight guys! You stopped me from totalling my hard drive.

I set the BIOS to Main RAID at first boot then plugged in my IDE drive in and the computer booted itself normally. I coppied the antimalware files onto the hard drive sucessfully.

I booted my infected computer with the hard drive in safe mode with command prompt and executed the anti malware installer a nice GUI popped up and installed the program.

At the moment I am scanning the drive for viruses and it has found 6 threats.

Are viruses usually in .dll files because thats where it found them?

Thanks a lot

canadaboy25

From my very limited windows knowledge yes .dll is a common file to infect

[joshnz]

Re: Accessing old IDE hard drive

Infections can be in any file mainly .scr .exe .dll .mp3 any file that can be executed and that is almost eveything

[canadaboy25]

Re: Accessing old IDE hard drive

Infections can be in any file mainly .scr .exe .dll .mp3 any file that can be executed and that is almost eveything

Wow thanks for the quick reply.

The quick scan finished with 7 threats which I removed and the problem still remains.

I am going to perform a full scan and see if that helps.

If you have any anti virus programs to reccomend please do.

canadaboy25

[shadow]

Re: Accessing old IDE hard drive

Wow thanks for the quick reply.

The quick scan finished with 7 threats which I removed and the problem still remains.

I am going to perform a full scan and see if that helps.

If you have any anti virus programs to reccomend please do.

canadaboy25

There are all sorts of anti-malware programs you can try. However what I tend to do in these sorts of situations is to do a backup of any required data, get all the license information off the PC if needed (windows, office etc.) and completely reinstall Windows.

In my opinion, it is generally quicker, easier and you will probably get better results by wiping everything and starting clean rather than trying to clean really persistent viruses/malware. It can be done, however it will take some experimentation and lots of time doing multiple scans with different programs.

[canadaboy25]

Re: Accessing old IDE hard drive

There are all sorts of anti-malware programs you can try. However what I tend to do in these sorts of situations is to do a backup of any required data, get all the license information off the PC if needed (windows, office etc.) and completely reinstall Windows.

In my opinion, it is generally quicker, easier and you will probably get better results by wiping everything and starting clean rather than trying to clean really persistent viruses/malware. It can be done, however it will take some experimentation and lots of time doing multiple scans with different programs.

I would like to try to remove the virus and see if i get anymore problems.

canadaboy25

[pfrcom]

Re: Accessing old IDE hard drive

If you have any anti virus programs to reccomend please do.

I use Avast free anti-virus - I think they offer a stand-alone rescue system, but last time I looked, charge for it

Recently fixed infected PCs using Avira rescue system, which boots into a customised Linux Ubuntu to scan the infected disk, thereby removing control from anything lurking under Windows - recommended

Google "Avira rescue system", download the ISO, burn it to a CD, then boot from it - it's intuitive after that - also slow to load, recommend you follow their instructions to put the ISO on a boot'able USB

[domas]

Re: Accessing old IDE hard drive

OP, why would you want to boot that drive as a master?? put the drive in your computer as slave, boot from your own hard drive, then scan the drive from your own computer with updated antivirus program, as the viruses do sometimes infect system files that are in use while the installation on particular drive is booted.

I hope you can follow my unclear ideas.

Else clean install is always an option.

Remember when you boot the dead computers installation, you can also use sfc /scannow in command prompt.

[SuperDuty]

Re: Accessing old IDE hard drive

IDE drives are generally not plug and play devices. So even if nothing gets killed when hot-plugging it in. It probably won't get recognised.

Edit: I think I remember years and years ago you could get IDE rack's, so you could pull hard drives in and out of a PC from the front with a handle. Can't remember if these were hot-pluggable or not. Perhaps IDE can be hot-plugged if ACPI is enabled in the BIOS? I would not try it regardless.

I've tried hot plugging an IDE drive with one of those racks last year...bad idea. The MOSFET on the rack's electronics got reaaaaally hot and it smelled like burnt components inside. Everything still worked after that though.

[canadaboy25]

Re: Accessing old IDE hard drive

Thanks for all of the info guys. I scanned with malwarebytes anti malware quick scan and found 7 threats which i deleted. I ran a full scan and found 1 threat which I deleted. The problem was still there. I downloaded kaspersky virus removal tool and it found 1 threat. I removed that and the computer fiannaly booted.

I now know that I can connect IDE drives to my good computer.

I don't know why anyone would spend their time writing viruses like these

Well doesnt matter my problem is gone

canadaboy25

[RJARRRPCGP]

Re: Accessing old IDE hard drive

Sounds like a bad USB stick. Sorry.

[canadaboy25]

Re: Accessing old IDE hard drive

Sounds like a bad USB stick. Sorry.

Hmm?

My stick works fine with any other computer.

The PC says that about any volume but i got it working now.

canadaboy25

[RJARRRPCGP]

Re: Accessing old IDE hard drive

Hmm?

My stick works fine with any other computer.

The PC says that about any volume but i got it working now.

canadaboy25

Looks like a bad USB port.

[canadaboy25]

Re: Accessing old IDE hard drive

Looks like a bad USB port.

The message came up when i was in safe mode command prompt trying to change the working directory.

The usb works fine in the same port when booted normally so there are no problems.

canadaboy25