Foreign Dynamic Disk problems: Give ’em a GreenCard already!

Getting the error that you cannot import a foreign disk? Looked in the Event Viewer’s System Log to find: “A disk group with the specified name already exists”? Not to worry! There is a solution, it just isn’t obvious.

This requires some general comfort with regedt32.exe, and I have only done this under Windows XP Pro.

1. Fire Up regedt32.exe.
2. Navigate to : HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\dmio\Boot Info
3. Right-mouse click on “Primary Disk Group” and select “delete” to remove it.
4. Quit the registry editor.
5. Reboot the machine.

Once the machine comes back up, you can go in to “Disk management” and successfully import the foreign disk.