Vista - Vista Disk Read error after removing xp drive

Well this is strange, I added a new drive for a vista install, in bios
I changed to boot order so it would become the default boot disk, then
proceeded to install and use vista. When I whated to run xp I would
shut down and change the boot order and all is well.
SO now I want to remove the xp drive all together from the machine.
when I power on, and the machine only reports 1 drive and it is the
default drive to boot from, so all ok.

but when it goes to boot, it reports disk read error. I did a boot
from the vista dvd and tried a repair but the repair program found no
errors. so I can't boot vista unless I have the xp disk installed.

any way to fix this or do I need to do a reformat/install ?

thanks

What you should have done is remove the XP drive completely BEFORE installing Vista.

Whats happened is that although the boot order was changed, the new hard disk had no boot sector, so the system booted from the XP drive. When you installed Vista, it modified THAT boot sector, and setup dual boot.

Even if you booted from the Vista DVD, and selcted the new drive as the destination, the setup will have picked up the existing boot sector on the old hard disk and will have modified that instead of writing a new one.

Return you old hard disk back to it's original location, and Vista should boot fine again. This will at least give you that opportunity to backup any critical data you need to keep before totally removing the XP drive and then re-installing Vista.

Is the XP drive smaller than the new drive? Why not just backup your data, remove the new hard disk, format the old XP drive and install Vista there, and then install the new hard disk again, format it, and use it as a dedicated data drive.