Dual boot XP/Win7 will not dual boot

Kaktussoft said:

Later you want to elimate winxp isn't it? So you will only use win7 afterwards? If so.... best thing is move the bootmgr and bootmenu to win7 partition. Steps to do: Assign a drive letter "longterm backup" partition assign the drive letter at least temporary. It can be done in disk management. What drive letter have you assigned to that partition?

Step 2 Bootmgr - Move to C:\ with EasyBCD
move the bootmanager to C. All was succesfull? Post results afterwards

Kaktussoft said:

Step 3: Partition - Mark as Inactive
Mark the "Longterm Backup" partition inactive. But only AFTER a successful move of bootmgr and boot menu (actually it's a copy). Reboot. If not booting... then do a Startup Repair . Post screenshot of disk management afterwards.

I used EasyBCD (had to download from MajorGeeks.com because it just would not let me download from the other location), and it said all was successful. Now I'm a little unclear and want to verify before I reboot, that I should set Longterm Backup partition inactive BEFORE I reboot. Is that correct? And then come back and do the rest?

Kaktussoft said:

In Elevated Command Prompt
bootmgr is on C:\?

Code:

attrib  c:\bootmgr

bootmenu as well? Does next command produce a lot of output?

Code:

bcdedit/store  c:\boot\bcd  /enum  all

c:\bootmgr
A SHR C:\bootmgr


Second command yields a host of output. Whenever it identifies a device, it's partition=C:

I shut it down. Complete reboot. All's well. Whew. Now to swap the cables, if there's enough room. Could be that when I took it to the PC repair shop (wireless stopped working, and I had not time to fix it), they swapped the cables, because they did take out both hard drives.

Anyway, now for the dual boot.

Can you post a new screenshot of Disk Management - Post a Screen Capture Image

New screenshots. First one is after making partition inactive. Second one is after boot.

It is correct, with Win7 booting itself from within its own Partition (System Active).

Do you need to add XP to a Dual Boot menu now? Install to WIn7 http://neosmart.net/Download/Register/1 to add XP by name and drive letter (or let it autocomplete letter).

Again the risk of having Win7 drive not be first in order is that if you do a reinstall or Startup Repair it can again derail the System flag to the first Primary partition. If you remain aware of that then you can leave it the way it is, just be sure to unplug the first drive if you ever do a Reinstall or Repairs.

If you do swap the drives now be sure that Win7 remains set first to boot, which can be achieved by merely swapping the data cables.