STOP 0×0000007B INACCESSABLE_BOOT_DEVICE

July 1, 2008

If you change the Serial Advanced Technology Attachment (SATA) mode of the boot drive to use the Advanced Host Controller Interface (AHCI) specification on a Windows Vista-based computer. When You then restart the computer you may receive the following error message:

Error message when you start a Windows Vista-based computer after you change the SATA mode of the boot drive: “STOP 0×0000007B INACCESSABLE_BOOT_DEVICE”

During the Windows Vista installation process, any unused storage drivers are disabled. This behavior speeds up the operating system’s startup process. When you change the boot drive to a driver that has been disabled, you must enable the new driver before you change the hardware configuration.

For example, assume that you install Windows Vista on a computer that contains a controller that uses the Pciide.sys driver. Later, you change the SATA mode to AHCI. Therefore, the drive must now load the Msahci.sys driver. However, you must enable the Msahci.sys driver before you make this change.

This issue affects only the boot drive. If the drive that you change is not the boot drive, you do not experience this issue.

To resolve this issue, enable the AHCI driver in the registry before you change the SATA mode of the boot drive. To do this, follow these steps:

1. Exit all Windows-based programs.

2. Click Start, type regedit in the Start Search box, and then press ENTER.

3. If you receive the User Account Control dialog box, click Continue.

4. Locate and then click the following registry subkey:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\Msahci

5. In the right pane, right-click Start in the Name column, and then click Modify.

6. In the Value data box, type 0, and then click OK.

7. On the File menu, click Exit to close Registry Editor.

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Regards

Marc Liron – Microsoft MVP

Marc Liron

Posted by marc | Filed Under Blog 

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