My PC runs Windows 8.1 on an SSD, and I have a HDD as a data drive as well.
On Friday night, I got home to my PC was sitting on the BIOS screen. I could immediately see that the HDD was no longer being recognized, and when I restarted the HDD was clearly making a clicking noise. It's an older drive and I have backups, so not the end of the world.
What didn't make sense was why the SSD wasn't booting. I disconnected the HDD, ensured that connections were all tighted, etc. but although the SSD drive was recognized, it wouldn't boot (no error messages about not finding a bootable device either, but I'm guessing this is a flaw in the BIOS).
I popped in the Windows 8.1 disk and did a repair, which fixed the problem, and Windows now boots normally.
My questions:
- What would cause a hard drive failing to affect another drive?
- My SSD is about three years old. Windows says it's health is 100%. Should I be considering replacing it based on this event?