Unable to boot into Windows 7 after installing Windows 8 on D drive

[Aweberman]

Here's the story.

I installed a new HDD and made it my new C drive.
I turned my old C drive into my D drive, then cloned it onto my C drive.

Then I waited a couple of weeks to make sure everything was working. It has been. I am able to boot into either drive, though it defaults to the C drive.

I decided to install Windows 8.1 on the D drive. After installing, I was in quite a low-resolution environment. (I have a monitor that likes to be 1920x1080, but Windows 8.1 wanted me to be at 1024xsomething.) It was getting late, so I figured I would try again another time.

I opted to restart the computer into Windows 8.1, just to make sure everything was working.

The option to boot into either drive appeared, though I noticed that Windows 8.1 was now listed as the default option and Windows 7 as the secondary. I clicked on Windows 8.1, and the computer instantly crashed.

Numerous subsequent reboots with attempts to boot into both OS yielded different results, which eventually fell broadly into these categories:

- When attempting to boot into Windows 8, a screen appears with a huge frowny emoticon. It tells me that it's saving some data and will attempt a reboot, but if I want to look up information later, to make note of this error message: CRITICAL_PROCESS_DIED.

- After an attempt at a normal boot, I get the advanced boot option screen, which gives me choices to boot into safe mode, into another OS, as well as many others. Among them is to attempt a normal reboot. This invariably leads to the above crash screen.

- When attempting to boot into Windows 7 -- from either the Windows 8 advanced boot options, my BIOS boot options screen, or the boot selection screen -- I receive BSOD; this happened twice. (But it was a hassle just trying to get an option to boot into Windows 7.)

I'm assuming that the two versions aren't playing nice somehow. Both have tried to repair the startup sequence, yielding the above results. Maybe part of the problem was trying to put Windows 8 on a secondary drive.

My temporary solution was to disconnect the D drive. Upon booting, a Windows 8 screen told me that a necessary component was missing; I was surprised to see that Windows 8 even entered the picture at all. It did give me the option of booting into a different OS. I chose it, and Windows 7 booted up with no problems.

The one difference from a normal startup into Windows 7 was a window that popped up telling me, "Windows has recovered from an unexpected shutdown." It then provided some information (appended below) and a couple of files (attached).

--Remy


Problem signature:
Problem Event Name: BlueScreen
OS Version: 6.1.7601.2.1.0.256.48
Locale ID: 1033

Additional information about the problem:
BCCode: c00002e3
BCP1: FFFFF8A007D21EE0
BCP2: FFFFFFFFC0000189
BCP3: 0000000000000000
BCP4: 0000000000000000
OS Version: 6_1_7601
Service Pack: 1_0
Product: 256_1

Files that help describe the problem:
C:\Windows\Minidump\042214-31012-01.dmp
C:\Users\Study\AppData\Local\Temp\WER-302766-0.sysdata.xml

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C:\Windows\system32\en-US\erofflps.txt

 

[gregrocker]

Did you boot the Windows 8 installation media to do the install? If not start over to Clean Install - Windows 8

For separate HD's I would unplug all other drives and then use the BIOS boot order or Boot Menu key to trigger the preferred drive.

If this isn't to your liking, install EasyBCD to Windows 7 to add Windows 8 to a Dual Boot menu.

You can change the preferred OS on that menu as shown in Default Operating System - Change Default Boot OS - Windows 7 Forums

 

[Aweberman]

Did you boot the Windows 8 installation media to do the install?

Yes. I'm using an ISO downloaded from the Microsoft website.

For separate HD's I would unplug all other drives and then use the BIOS boot order or Boot Menu key to trigger the preferred drive.

I believe I have done the first part of this suggestion (unplugging other devices). I have not subsequently used the boot menu options. I will try that.

If this isn't to your liking, install EasyBCD to Windows 7 to add Windows 8 to a Dual Boot menu.

I have also installed this. Thanks for the suggestion!