No boot without installation disk

Alright, so I tried renaming the boot.ini file on my XP partition to boot.backup.ini, hoping it would force my system to ignore it, and ran the repair utility again from the W7 installation disk. Same thing, the utility said it didn't find anything wrong and there is still no boot.ini file on my W7 partition. I'd rather let windows make the boot.ini instead of writing one, because I am not entirely sure what I'm doing. Is there a solution out there to this problem?

Hi kein,

please post a screenshot of Disk Management window:

https://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials...en-forums.html

Here you go:

Hi,

Boot is the partition you are currently booted into. System is the partition containing the boot critical files. 7 won't make a boot.ini on the root of the drive.

If you messed with the original XP boot.ini - put it back exactly the way it was.

I would assume the bios boot order has cdrom first, Disk0 second.

Try this:

From within 7 ( with the dvd in the drive) - as you are now, in fact.

In Disk Management, rt click the IDE partition and assign letter J.

Open an elevated command and type:

bcdboot c:\windows /s j:

then press enter

H:\boot\bootsect.exe /nt60 j: /force /mbr

then press enter.

Remove the dvd from the drive and restart.

Back in 7, open an elevated cmd and type ( press enter after each line):


bcdedit /create {ntldr} /d "Windows XP"

bcdedit /set {ntldr} device boot

bcdedit /set {ntldr} path \ntldr

bcdedit /displayorder {ntldr} /addlast


Then close cmd prompt.

Hope it helps

I had a sneaking suspicion you would look at that IDE drive, as I started wondering about it myself. I'll try all that and post here whether it works or not. Either way, I thank you for your help.

I ran into a problem right away. I can't copy the boot files from the IDE...it's not quite working for some reason (says failure to copy). I haven't used that drive in a long time now because it was acting up. It has my original XP on it. I had cloned that drive to the XP partition on that SATA drive. Apparently my machine has been booting from the IDE all this time? At any rate, if I click on the IDE in explorer it show 0 files, but looking at properties it shows full. So my question is, can't I just format the IDE (assuming it will let me)? I really don't care about the data on it any more. If I do this, in effect destroying the bootfiles, would the repair feature on the disc fix my problem?

Ok, never mind, I was reading another post, so I guess I cannot format the IDE because it is the "system". So could I simply disconnect it? I guess all I need to know is, if there are no boot files available, will the Windows 7 installation disk repair tool make them on my Windows 7 drive?

Yes it will make the 7 critical boot files. - did you chicken out of the commands above?

You still need to do the commands to add XP to bcd after you disconnected IDE drive and run startup repair from the 7 ( may take 3 runs).

You need to make sure that Disk1 is first in Bios boot order.

You will need to also make sure vthe 3 XP bootfiles are on the 7 partition.

They are hidden files - ntldr, ntdetect.com and boot.ini

No, I tried the first command and it wouldn't work.

Ok, so I can disconnect the IDE, then start the computer, fire up the BIOS, make sure the boot order is DVD, then Disk 1, then save/exit, reboot on the DVD disk, run the repair tool and reboot how many ever times it takes to get it to not detect anything, then take the DVD out, boot up normal, if Win 7 comes on, then go from here:

Back in 7, open an elevated cmd and type ( press enter after each line):


bcdedit /create {ntldr} /d "Windows XP"

bcdedit /set {ntldr} device boot

bcdedit /set {ntldr} path \ntldr

bcdedit /displayorder {ntldr} /addlast


Then close cmd prompt.

Is that all correct?