I am running Vista Ultimate 32-bit on a SCSI boot drive, which shows
correctly as Physical Disk 0 in Vista's Logical Disk Manager snap-in.
It is partitioned as Drive C. I have an additional SCSI drive for
data partitioned as Drive D that shows correctly as Physical Disk 1.
The SCSI drives are connected to an Adaptec 19160 host adapter in the
PCI slot.
I recently added an external e-SATA hard drive to one of the internal
motherboard SATA ports configured as ACHI to allow for hot-plug
capability. Since apparently the motherboard SATA ports have priority
over those of an add-in HDD controller, Vista now sees my external e-
SATA drive as Physical Disk 0 and my SCSI boot drive became Physical
Disk 1 and so on. The drive letters of the SCSI drives (C and D) did
not change and I assigned the
e-SATA as Drive letter H. Vista seems to have adjusted to this
situation and I have no problem booting and using all the drives. In
fact, if I unplug (or power off) the e-SATA drive, Logical Disk
Manager just shows no more Physical Disk 0. If I re-connect the e-
SATA drive, it shows up as Physical Disk 0 again.
I cannot beleive that Vista is smart enough to adapt to this. I
always thought that the boot drive must be on Physical Disk 0, at lest
back in the XP days. My question is am I asking for trouble by doing
this and can I expect to see any problems in the future by not having
the boot drive as Physical Disk 0?
If I install an add-in e-SATA controller card, then the external SATA
drive would become Physical Disk 2, but I'd prefer to use the SATA on
the motherboard. Does anyone foresee any problem with the boot drive
partition NOT being on Physical Disk 0? I'd appeciate knowledgeable
comments. Thanks.

Suggest you try the microsoft.public.windows.vista.hardware_devices
newsgroup

"RonnieJP" <ronniejp@pacbell.net> wrote in message
news:1181934114.677059.260000@n2g2000hse.googlegro ups.com...
>I am running Vista Ultimate 32-bit on a SCSI boot drive, which shows
> correctly as Physical Disk 0 in Vista's Logical Disk Manager snap-in.
> It is partitioned as Drive C. I have an additional SCSI drive for
> data partitioned as Drive D that shows correctly as Physical Disk 1.
> The SCSI drives are connected to an Adaptec 19160 host adapter in the
> PCI slot.
> I recently added an external e-SATA hard drive to one of the internal
> motherboard SATA ports configured as ACHI to allow for hot-plug
> capability. Since apparently the motherboard SATA ports have priority
> over those of an add-in HDD controller, Vista now sees my external e-
> SATA drive as Physical Disk 0 and my SCSI boot drive became Physical
> Disk 1 and so on. The drive letters of the SCSI drives (C and D) did
> not change and I assigned the
> e-SATA as Drive letter H. Vista seems to have adjusted to this
> situation and I have no problem booting and using all the drives. In
> fact, if I unplug (or power off) the e-SATA drive, Logical Disk
> Manager just shows no more Physical Disk 0. If I re-connect the e-
> SATA drive, it shows up as Physical Disk 0 again.
> I cannot beleive that Vista is smart enough to adapt to this. I
> always thought that the boot drive must be on Physical Disk 0, at lest
> back in the XP days. My question is am I asking for trouble by doing
> this and can I expect to see any problems in the future by not having
> the boot drive as Physical Disk 0?
> If I install an add-in e-SATA controller card, then the external SATA
> drive would become Physical Disk 2, but I'd prefer to use the SATA on
> the motherboard. Does anyone foresee any problem with the boot drive
> partition NOT being on Physical Disk 0? I'd appeciate knowledgeable
> comments. Thanks.
>

I'm not sure it's as much Vista adapting as your BIOS.
If the BIOS settings are such that the correct drive is set to boot when
installed/attached, that would determine the boot order before Vista's boot
manager even gets involved.

--
A Professional Amateur...If anyone knew it all, none of would be here!
CarGodZeroOne********.com
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"RonnieJP" <ronniejp@pacbell.net> wrote in message
news:1181934114.677059.260000@n2g2000hse.googlegro ups.com...
>I am running Vista Ultimate 32-bit on a SCSI boot drive, which shows
> correctly as Physical Disk 0 in Vista's Logical Disk Manager snap-in.
> It is partitioned as Drive C. I have an additional SCSI drive for
> data partitioned as Drive D that shows correctly as Physical Disk 1.
> The SCSI drives are connected to an Adaptec 19160 host adapter in the
> PCI slot.
> I recently added an external e-SATA hard drive to one of the internal
> motherboard SATA ports configured as ACHI to allow for hot-plug
> capability. Since apparently the motherboard SATA ports have priority
> over those of an add-in HDD controller, Vista now sees my external e-
> SATA drive as Physical Disk 0 and my SCSI boot drive became Physical
> Disk 1 and so on. The drive letters of the SCSI drives (C and D) did
> not change and I assigned the
> e-SATA as Drive letter H. Vista seems to have adjusted to this
> situation and I have no problem booting and using all the drives. In
> fact, if I unplug (or power off) the e-SATA drive, Logical Disk
> Manager just shows no more Physical Disk 0. If I re-connect the e-
> SATA drive, it shows up as Physical Disk 0 again.
> I cannot beleive that Vista is smart enough to adapt to this. I
> always thought that the boot drive must be on Physical Disk 0, at lest
> back in the XP days. My question is am I asking for trouble by doing
> this and can I expect to see any problems in the future by not having
> the boot drive as Physical Disk 0?
> If I install an add-in e-SATA controller card, then the external SATA
> drive would become Physical Disk 2, but I'd prefer to use the SATA on
> the motherboard. Does anyone foresee any problem with the boot drive
> partition NOT being on Physical Disk 0? I'd appeciate knowledgeable
> comments. Thanks.
>

"RonnieJP" <ronniejp@pacbell.net> wrote in message
news:1181934114.677059.260000@n2g2000hse.googlegro ups.com...
>I am running Vista Ultimate 32-bit on a SCSI boot drive, which shows
> correctly as Physical Disk 0 in Vista's Logical Disk Manager snap-in.
> It is partitioned as Drive C. I have an additional SCSI drive for
> data partitioned as Drive D that shows correctly as Physical Disk 1.
> The SCSI drives are connected to an Adaptec 19160 host adapter in the
> PCI slot.
> I recently added an external e-SATA hard drive to one of the internal
> motherboard SATA ports configured as ACHI to allow for hot-plug
> capability. Since apparently the motherboard SATA ports have priority
> over those of an add-in HDD controller, Vista now sees my external e-
> SATA drive as Physical Disk 0 and my SCSI boot drive became Physical
> Disk 1 and so on. The drive letters of the SCSI drives (C and D) did
> not change and I assigned the
> e-SATA as Drive letter H. Vista seems to have adjusted to this
> situation and I have no problem booting and using all the drives. In
> fact, if I unplug (or power off) the e-SATA drive, Logical Disk
> Manager just shows no more Physical Disk 0. If I re-connect the e-
> SATA drive, it shows up as Physical Disk 0 again.
> I cannot beleive that Vista is smart enough to adapt to this. I
> always thought that the boot drive must be on Physical Disk 0, at lest
> back in the XP days. My question is am I asking for trouble by doing
> this and can I expect to see any problems in the future by not having
> the boot drive as Physical Disk 0?
> If I install an add-in e-SATA controller card, then the external SATA
> drive would become Physical Disk 2, but I'd prefer to use the SATA on
> the motherboard. Does anyone foresee any problem with the boot drive
> partition NOT being on Physical Disk 0? I'd appeciate knowledgeable
> comments. Thanks.
>