Removing Dual Boot Windows 7

I've read a few related posting/etc, but my problems are a slight various.

I was using the Free Window 7 Ultimate Beta for a few months.
Then bought a new Quad i7 64-Bit Laptop with 64-Bit Windows 7 Pro pre-installed.
But wanted a fresh clean install with partitions and without most unwanted pre-installs.
Made sure I had all the required drivers plus the Windows 7 64-bit DvD.
I then ran into a fresh install problem that many others seem to have.
Installing from the 64-Bit Windows 7 Pro Dvd to a totally clean disk.
Well, for thousands like me, it hangs and fails, but I eventually found a solution as below.
Tried several other Internet/forum/blog solutions which all failed, but below worked.

On a single disk, I made two partitions (plus the recovery partition) 0, 1, and 2
I had previously made a bootable install Dvd for the now old Ultimate Beta.
So, I installed that previous Windows 7 Ultimate Beta (now expired) onto partition 2
I assumed installing onto partition 2 was a clever bit of pre-planning.
All ok and after it booted up fine, I then could/did install the new 64-Bit Windows 7 Pro onto partition 1.

So, now I have a dual boot, but both are Windows 7 and I boot and use the new Windows 7 Pro fine.
But even though the new wanted O/S is on partition 1 and the unwanted Beta is on partition 2,
the registry and all paths on the wanted partiton 1 are labeled as D:\

I have installed onto this this D: almost everything I want and need.
There is nothing I need or want on partition 2 with old Beta O/S but labeled C:

I want to "safely" ...
a) totally zap partition 2 which is labeled C: and perhaps leave unallocated
b) re-label partition 1 from D: to C: without confusing the bootmgr nor registry.
c) remove the dual boot selection screen
d) then reclam the unallocated space and recreate a new partition and a new formatted logical drive D:

Fairly confident, but also very afraid I might end-up lossing everything again and starting all over again.
Any help or advice would be extremely welcomed.

Unfortunately you cannot change the driver letter of installed OS without it becoming unbootable.

However there is no reason you can't operate Win7 on D drive like it currently is set up.

Please post a screenshot of your full Disk management drive map so we can give you the exact steps. Use Snipping Tool in Start Menu, attach file using Paper Clip in Reply Box.

The steps are roughly to use either Diskpart commands from the Win7 DVD or free Partition Wizard bootable CD (best tool for Win7 64 bit) to mark D: active, delete C, then recover System MBR into D by booting Win7 DVD Repair console or Repair CD and running Startup Repair up to 3 separate times with reboots.

But let us see the screenshot so we can be sure there are no potential complications.

ejkramer,
Welcome to Seven Forums.

There are those here better qualified to answer your question than I am but what I would like to recommend very strongly is getting yourself an external USB drive for backup purposes. Personally, I've a ~150 Gig one and a ~250 Gig one. The smaller one I use for backing up my Asus Netbook and the larger one for backing up my Toshiba laptop.

Get yourself one and try out Window 7's Backup and Restore.

This program is fantastic and drastically underrated. Using Backup & Restore (now, I'm not talking about the System Restore point thing) is ridiculously simple. Try it out, experiment with the various settings if you would like (I certainly did).

Now the reason I'm so advocating that you use this program is because if anything goes wrong, then you will need to a restore. With this program you can do a complete system image backup and full system backup restore. You can store, use, etc as many backups as that external drive will hold. Many here are not aware that Win 7's Backup and Restore can do multiple backups and restores to the same external drive.

Use of the restore half of the game will be easier if you make a System Repair CD. That's also one of the options you have with Backup And Restore.

With the testing that I've done, then regular backups and restores have become second nature with me and the beauty of this built-in Backup And Restore capability is that it works! It is free. It is well-documented and the help from WIN + F1 | typing Backup and Restore in the search bar and then hitting enter key is fantastic.

There are many things which can go wrong or be overlooked when deleting, moving, reassigning partitions and vie one method or the other altering the Boot Configuration Data file used by Win 7. Following Boy Scout advice- Be Prepared.

hope this snip works and is what you need

Turns out this is the easiest possible: You only need to Delete Ultimate partition in Disk Management.

Then either extend Pro partition or make a new data partition there.

Partition or Volume - Extend

Partition or Volume - Create New

I have available USB external Disks, partition and disk image software. Already tried partition delete and attempted "Repair", but failed and had to stat completely over. If have a full disk backup image, but it also has both/all partitions and can't seem to use it to put back just the wanted partition and then repair. The bootmgr and registry I assume the related problem.

Are you sure the delete Ultimate and extended W7_Pro will work ? and will the result still be labeled D: ?
and if it works, but stays D:, could I not image/copy/backup to external, and somehow move back as C: ?

Also, I think the Dual Boot screen might still appear even after Ultimate O/S is removed. Right ?
I'm still afraid and a little unsure.

If the boot menu appears after deleting RC, then remove the Ultimate listing in msconfig>boot tab.

If this fails, install EasyBCD 2.0 and Remove Ultimate on the Add/Remove tab.

gregrocker said:

If the boot menu appears after deleting RC, then remove the Ultimate listing in msconfig>boot tab.

I have vista installed on my C drive and Win7 installed on my D drive. I used msconfig to remove the boot menu and to make win7 the default OS. The same should work for you.