Windows 7: Dual boot help! Huge help needed!

Okay, so I wanted to be able to dual boot Windows 7 and Fedora (A Red Hat distro). I made a 5 GB partition and installed Fedora onto it, and everything seemed to be going well, Then, when I tried to boot up Windows instead of Fedora, it loaded the system recovery program. I freaked out. The files on the partition with Windows 7 are still there and I can use the partition in Fedora as a storage device, but it won' boot Windows. I need major help! I do not want to be stuck with this!

My very computer is at stake!

EDIT: I also even tried to use the Windows 7 install disk and tried making the partition active again, but it didn't work. The setup actually recognizes that Windows 7 is there, but my computer doesn't.

Boot the 7 dvd , at the install now screen, press shift+f10 together.

In the command window that opens, type

diskpart

lis vol

( get your Windows 7 drive letter)

exi

bcdboot <yourwin7driveletter>:\windows /s <yourwin7driveletter>:

bootsect /nt60 <yourwin7driveletter>: /mbr


[press enter after each of the above commands]

Welcome to the forums.

This sounds to me like you've replaced the Windows bootloader with the Linux (GRUB) bootloader.

Use the tutorial at Restoring Windows Boot Loader Manually | Knowledge Base to reinstate the Windows bootloader (scroll down to the Vista/7 bit).

I hope this helps.

Oli

I've tried that in a different way, but I haven't tried that. How do I get my Windows 7 drive letter? I think I saw that it was D:, but I don't know for sure. Also, isn't it "list vol"? I don't want to bust your chops, but I just want to make sure that I'm getting everything right.

Thank you!

Oh, I'll try this. This seems like it'll help! I'll be back in a sec to check.

lis vol works fine. Follow the instructions exactly as written.

You will have to get the Windows 7 drive letter from the size of the volume, or the label. The letter may be different from how you see it in windows.

what happened is that your windows bootloader is broken.
Recovering bootloader is easy. Just boot with your Windows 7 DVd , now choose "Command Prompt" in order to run the desired utility which is called "bootsect.exe". Bootsect is located inside the boot folder so change your directory to boot.
Now run
"bootrec.exe /nt60 C:\" (default position of your Windows partition is C:/).
After that, type
bootrec.exe /fixmbr
bootrec.exe /fixboot
bootrec.exe /rebuildbcd

Oh my god, thank you! I can't believe you all knew exactly what to do! I guess this is a common problem when dual booting windows and something non-windows. I like this forum. Thanks again!

No problem and you're welcome.

As you are new to the forum I thought you might like to know how to mark threads as solved as well as the uses of some of the other buttons.

To the top right of this post you will see 3 icons. An orange (+), a set of scales and a red and white warning triangle.

The orange (+) or blue (-) denotes whether a user is on or offline (orange = on, blue = off).

The scales are used to give rep points; click this button if someone has helped you significantly or solved your queries (only give this to posts that you think really deserve it).

The red and white warning triangle is used to denote either an abusive post OR to mark a thread as solved (just put solved in the box that comes up and the admins or moderators will mark it solved).

Mark this thread solved when your 100% sue it's fixed.

Oli

If you want to dual boot Linux with Windows, the easiest way is to use our unique VBoot technology. You simply copy a Linux VHD file to your NTFS disk, and eveything is inside this file. No partitions are needed.

More info is here:

Ubuntu 10.04 VHD available for download - VMLite