Help. Dual boot won't boot.

Hi Ted. Thanks for your suggestions.
I followed the tutorial but cannot seem to boot into safe mode. If I press F8 I just get a box with boot options in it (HDD, DVD Drive etc.)
If I choose the hard drive it just leaves me with the blinking cursor forever.
I checked out the Asus mobo manual (section 3.3.5) and had a closer look at my 2 Samsung Spinpoints. They both show up identically in this screen so I cannot differentiate between the storage drive and the drive with the 2 installs on it.

I'm beginning to think all is lost and that I'm going to have to take torrentg's advice and do a complete install of Vista on one of the drives.
That's a real pain as I'll lose a lot of programmes I'll struggle to replace and have to go through the whole setup again.
Also I'll have to create another partition for W7 once I've got Vista going.
As I said in a previous post if I boot from Easus Partition Manager I can see both drives and distiguish the partioned drive with the OSs on it.
If I simply disconnect one of the HDDs and then do this I should be able to see whether I've got the drive I want. It's a 50/50 chance I'll get the right one. If not I'll know it's the other.
If I then do a standard Vista install on that disk will it format the whole drive, remove any partitions (and W7), and enable me to boot?
I am reluctant to do this but there doesn't seem to be any other way. At least I'll then be able to reconnect the other drive with all my photos and music on and access it.

What do you think? Will this work?

Thanks for the help, John

Hi John,

Yes, it makes sense to find the drive with o/s 's installed.

You can choose which partition on that drive you wish to install Vista on - you don't need to format the other one.

Vista will create a compatible mbr and bootsector and install it's own bootmgr and Boot folder on the partition marked as Active - the rest of the Vista will be installed on whichever partition you clicked on when you got the partition screen during installation.

If you click directly on the partition you wish to install to - do not select Drive Options (advanced) - you will have the option to save the existing contents into a Windows. Old folder. You can fish anything you need out of there after.

If the first partition is Active, with your existing Vista installation on it (Easeus boot cd will tell you which is the Active partition) :

1. You could install Vista on the partition it is already on (I assume the first one).

OR

2. You could install Vista on the second partition , where (I assume 7 is now).

If you take the second option, you should find the hd is bootable - and you have your original Vista partition intact - you will have a second Vista installation as well , but that doesn't matter.

Set the first Vista partition as default in msconfig boot tab , then you can remove the second one, or install 7 over it.

Hi guys and thanks for your swift replies.
Dwarf. I only got the mobo a couple of months ago so I think the battery is ok . also I already removed it to reset my cmos and it took my clock back to 2002. when I put it back in it seemed ok.
Ted and SIW2. Isn't the custom install of Vista what I already did as mentioned in my original post.
I tried repair installs and they did not help so I did a custom Vista install to the partition Vista was already on. This all seemed to work ok but I still couldn't boot into Vista (orW7)
Why would it be any different if I do it again?
As you will know a custom install asks me where I want to put it so I just clicked the original Vista partition.
Doing that got rid of the disk read error message but left me with the eternal blinking cursor and still no boot.
Is this what you mean me to try?

Thanks a lot, John

Just had a thought, John.

When you have only the HD with o/s on it attached - try running startup repair - you never know.

You might also make sure the first partition is marked as Active - if not, you can use Easeus to mark it active - probably need to rt click the first partition and select mark Active, or similar, from the Easeus context menu.

EDIT: Just seen your last post - the blinking cursor would seem to indicate nothing bootable can be found.

Ah. I see what you mean SIW2. Let me confirm this with you.
I do a custom install of Vista on my second partition (which now has W7 on it) and that should enable me to boot into that new install of Vista?
I'm not clear on the msconfig boot tab part. Also, if I get through that bit I'll then be booting into my original Vista install yes?
If I then install W7 over the new Vista install will I still get a dual boot?

Many thanks, John

SIW2 said:

Just had a thought, John.

When you have only the HD with o/s on it attached - try running startup repair - you never know.

You might also make sure the first partition is marked as Active - if not, you can use Easeus to mark it active - probably need to rt click the first partition and select mark Active, or similar, from the Easeus context menu.

EDIT: Just seen your last post - the blinking cursor would seem to indicate nothing bootable can be found.

That seems to be the case. everything I try I get the blinking cursor. why would this be?