Seven Install Error (Very Weird)

01chris02 said:

Ok, thanks for looking at this for a start and any help will be appreciated..

Basically my friend asked me to install seven on his laptop for him so that it would dual boot his current os and seven. Both are 32 bit so thats ok. The laptop is an Acer Aspire 5920, and had two partitions on the laptop when I looked at it. The main one was for vista and it was called ACER. The second seemingly has no purpose and he never used it and was called DATA. So I thought that it would be easy enough, just format the DATA partition and install seven on it. So I started up the win-7 install disc and installed it to the DATA partition after formatting it with the win-7 partitioning tools. This was ok and at the end of installation it wanted to restart and I let it. It then rebooted and completed setup. This should be it done. So I removed the disc and booted like normal, the windows boot manager came up like ususal giving me the choice of what os to boot into, so I booted into vista to check it was all right. It was. So then I decided I would go ahead and set up his user and all for him so I booted into seven. I managed to set it up and it once again (like normal) wanted to restart. So it did...

But now it boots past the bios screen and nothing appears. Even after 10 minutes nothing loads. Only a single underslash i.e. _ flashes. (EDIT: This is the BSOD!) The bootloader doesn't even appear! Just the underslash! I have never encounted this problem before and I am extremely confused as to why this has happened! I tried the install again but the same result came up.

I am in serious need of help as this is my mates laptop and he requires it for his work.

PLEASE ASSIST!

Hi 01chris02, and welcome to Windows Seven Forums!

Ouch with the install. My first suggestion would be to get the Vista 32 DVD and do a startup repair or a repair install, in order to get your friend up and running. Then you can re-do the dual boot with 7 afterwards.

Dual booting is very popular and usually does not present much of a problem. Sometimes getting rid of the old OS after using 7 creates problems for users. Here is a thread that may give you some ideas on how to avoid some problems.

Changing the System Partition?

After you get Vista working again, I would suggest you move the Vista partition to the "End" (right side) of the hard drive and install 7 at the beginning of the hard drive. If you have any questions about doing this, post back when you are ready for this.

First lets try to get Vista back.

Cheers!
Robert

iseeuu said:

01chris02 said:

Ok, thanks for looking at this for a start and any help will be appreciated..

Basically my friend asked me to install seven on his laptop for him so that it would dual boot his current os and seven. Both are 32 bit so thats ok. The laptop is an Acer Aspire 5920, and had two partitions on the laptop when I looked at it. The main one was for vista and it was called ACER. The second seemingly has no purpose and he never used it and was called DATA. So I thought that it would be easy enough, just format the DATA partition and install seven on it. So I started up the win-7 install disc and installed it to the DATA partition after formatting it with the win-7 partitioning tools. This was ok and at the end of installation it wanted to restart and I let it. It then rebooted and completed setup. This should be it done. So I removed the disc and booted like normal, the windows boot manager came up like ususal giving me the choice of what os to boot into, so I booted into vista to check it was all right. It was. So then I decided I would go ahead and set up his user and all for him so I booted into seven. I managed to set it up and it once again (like normal) wanted to restart. So it did...

But now it boots past the bios screen and nothing appears. Even after 10 minutes nothing loads. Only a single underslash i.e. _ flashes. (EDIT: This is the BSOD!) The bootloader doesn't even appear! Just the underslash! I have never encounted this problem before and I am extremely confused as to why this has happened! I tried the install again but the same result came up.

I am in serious need of help as this is my mates laptop and he requires it for his work.

PLEASE ASSIST!

Hi 01chris02, and welcome to Windows Seven Forums!

Ouch with the install. My first suggestion would be to get the Vista 32 DVD and do a startup repair or a repair install, in order to get your friend up and running. Then you can re-do the dual boot with 7 afterwards.

Dual booting is very popular and usually does not present much of a problem. Sometimes getting rid of the old OS after using 7 creates problems for users. Here is a thread that may give you some ideas on how to avoid some problems.

Changing the System Partition?

After you get Vista working again, I would suggest you move the Vista partition to the "End" (right side) of the hard drive and install 7 at the beginning of the hard drive. If you have any questions about doing this, post back when you are ready for this.

First lets try to get Vista back.

Cheers!
Robert

Thanks Robert for the warm welcome :),

While I was offline there I successfully managed to remove windows 7 and restore vista to its original state. I re-did the setup again. During the setup there is a point at which the disc can be removed to access the bootloader in its regular state (i.e. choice of os's) On this screen I found that the vista paratition could still be booted into again but the seven partition was only available to boot into first time use. When I continued into first time use setup I recieved the BlackSOD after the neccessary reboot. So in an attempt to reassure myself I have fully removed 7 from the bootloader using the vista boot manager. I have also removed the 7 partiton but I am willing to install again in an attempt to get this working as my friend really wants Win7 :)

Really I am fairly good with computers but I lack specific knowledge in the booting of a computer. I am aware with how a computer loads but in terms of the mbr, bcd and various codes used in booting I am useless. I have to give the laptop back to my friend tomorow as he requires it again but if you have any more advice it would be appreciated so that I could attempt to install win 7 again next weekend as it past 1 oclock now and I, quite frankly am exhausted lol. We are having renevations at our house at the moment and the house is a state. lol

As said if you have any more knowledge it would be appreciated.

Thanks,
Chris

You seem unnecessarily concerned with removing the install disk, to the point I suspect you removed it too early.

Boot from the installer and install to a second partition you create and format using Custom>Advanced tools.

This time don't take the install DVD out. There is no need. Just leave it and see if it completes something it didn't before.

Windows 7 will configure correctly the dual boot menu if you install it correctly.

01chris02 said:

Really I am fairly good with computers but I lack specific knowledge in the booting of a computer. I am aware with how a computer loads but in terms of the mbr, bcd and various codes used in booting I am useless. I have to give the laptop back to my friend tomorow as he requires it again but if you have any more advice it would be appreciated so that I could attempt to install win 7 again next weekend as it past 1 oclock now and I, quite frankly am exhausted lol. We are having renevations at our house at the moment and the house is a state. lol

As said if you have any more knowledge it would be appreciated.

Thanks,
Chris

Chris;
I am not sure about Vista, but 7 wants a 100MB partition at the beginning of the hard drive. Also, those who have decided to remove the old partition at the beginning of their hard drive discover that Windows cannot extend a partition to the LEFT. So, again I suggest you move Vista to the end of the hard drive and install 7 (including its 100MB partition) at the beginning of the partition. Then follow gregrocker's advice about leaving the DVD and see if the install is successful.

Cheers!
Robert