Triple boot problem - 2x HDDs, 2x Win7s & 1x WinXP. How to work this?

NellyPuff · 09 Oct 2010

I've had this working before, but can't remember how i did it (i've had to format the disks).

What i want is:

Main drive (SSD): Win7 Pro 64bit

Secondary drive (HDD): Win7 pro 64 bit & WinXP Pro

With the boot screen in the order of:

Win7 Pro (HDD)
WinXP Pro (HDD)
Win7 Pro (SSD)

**** Nobody will understand why i am installing Win7 twice on the same machine, albeit 2 different drives. If you REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEALLY want to know then PM me & i'll explain, but for now, let's continue...

I've had this working before so i know it can be done, but for some reason it's not letting me do it now since the format.

I can get WinXP (HDD) to boot, i can get Win7 (SSD) to boot, but not Win7 (HDD).

The SSD is the primary boot disk within the BIOS.
I'm running EasyBCD from within the SSD.

I don't FULLY understand how to use EasyBCD so my first 2 successful attempts were probably flukes as i can't remember what i did within EasyBCD to make it possible.

I'm running the latest version of EasyBCD.
I installed in the order of:
Disconnect SSD
Install WinXP (HDD)
Install Win7 (HDD)
re-connect SSD
Install Win7 (SSD)

^^^ this is exactly the order i did it in the last time it worked.

this enables me to boot to the SSD only, from which i run EasyBCD & can then access WinXP when the PC restarts, but not Win7 (HDD)

Would really love a bit of help with this. Thanks to anyone who can.

zigzag3143 · 09 Oct 2010

NellyPuff said:

I've had this working before, but can't remember how i did it (i've had to format the disks).

What i want is:

Main drive (SSD): Win7 Pro 64bit

Secondary drive (HDD): Win7 pro 64 bit & WinXP Pro

With the boot screen in the order of:

Win7 Pro (HDD)
WinXP Pro (HDD)
Win7 Pro (SSD)

**** Nobody will understand why i am installing Win7 twice on the same machine, albeit 2 different drives. If you REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEALLY want to know then PM me & i'll explain, but for now, let's continue...

I've had this working before so i know it can be done, but for some reason it's not letting me do it now since the format.

I can get WinXP (HDD) to boot, i can get Win7 (SSD) to boot, but not Win7 (HDD).

The SSD is the primary boot disk within the BIOS.
I'm running EasyBCD from within the SSD.

I don't FULLY understand how to use EasyBCD so my first 2 successful attempts were probably flukes as i can't remember what i did within EasyBCD to make it possible.

I'm running the latest version of EasyBCD.
I installed in the order of:
Disconnect SSD
Install WinXP (HDD)
Install Win7 (HDD)
re-connect SSD
Install Win7 (SSD)

^^^ this is exactly the order i did it in the last time it worked.

this enables me to boot to the SSD only, from which i run EasyBCD & can then access WinXP when the PC restarts, but not Win7 (HDD)

Would really love a bit of help with this. Thanks to anyone who can.

Have a felling I know why. JUST A THEORY

On HD
since you installed xp first its prime OS
when you installed win 7 it parked a hidden folder called boot in the XP partition to make those two dual boot.

ON SSD

Win 7 by itself.

XP works fine, win 7 on ssd works fine, wine 7 on HD cant boot because boot folder is in XP partition.

I am not great with BCDedit or Easy but have a feeling there is a way to do it with them.

Hope someone with more loader editing experience is about.

In fact I will ask for someone with more editing experience to help.

Ken J

Night Hawk · 09 Oct 2010

Hello NellyPuff Welcome to the Seven Forums!

Nobody knows why? I do! I ran two separate 64bit RC installs on two separate drives along with the 32bit on a 3rd. Before that I had a beta build on the second primary of an XP/Vista dual boot across two drives. And even for a time I had the 64bit RC, Vista, and XP across 3 drives before doing away with XP completely!

Once the retail 7 was out the 64bit Ultimate became "the" default OS while others saw virual machines being another option available between the new XP Mode and other VM players like Virtual Box. For a triple boot you already most everything you need there however.

With the SSD set as the default drive you can add both XP Pro and the second 7 install into the Host drive's BCD store there using EasyBCD that zigzag343 was referring to. That's a free bcd editing program used quite a bit by those who wish to dual boot XP along with 7.

The order in how you installed the 7 install on the second drive however if XP went on last would automatically overwrite the 7 mbr entries on that particular drive requireing the startup repair tool or now with the SSD in use if added on later simply add the new entry in for the second 7 install.

The guide for setting up a dual boot of XP with 7 will help here in explaining each step. Dual Boot Installation with Windows 7 and XP

In the same manner you would add the XP entry in since that is already done you would add the new entry for 7 in as well only not need to copy boot files over to the SSD drive since you already have 7 there. You will need to associate the 7 entry to the correct drive letter presently assigned in the host 7 for this to work however. First you need to assign a drive letter for that 7 install to see it initialized.