Dual boot with Windows 7, and XP no longer appears in Boot Manager

Hello,

I have been using windows xp for a long time. I have two actual HD, one partitioned into 4, and another without any partition, giving me a total of 5. I was using two instance of windows xp installed in drive C and another in drive E (both are actually located in just one HD, but the other HD somehow got in between the two)

I finally decided to change the windows xp in drive C into windows 7. After installation, my previous option of choosing between which windows xp to use no longer appears and it goes straight to my new windows 7. I tried these four command :

bcdedit /create {ntldr} /d "Windows XP"
bcdedit /set {ntldr} device partition=E:
bcdedit /set {ntldr} path \ntldr
bcdedit /displayorder {ntldr} /addlast

So now an option appears before loading any windows but whenever i try to go to windows xp, it cant. It seems like i need to do more bcdedit.

Please help. Thanks!

Regards,
Deggen

Another physical hard drive can not possibly get between 2 partitions on a totally seperate physical hard drive.

If you can get in to your machine, post us a shot of disk management.

> Another physical hard drive can not possibly get between 2 partitions on a totally seperate physical hard drive.

You are absolutely correct. I mentioned these details because in windows XP, the boot.ini uses lines like these "multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Windows XP" /fastdetect " which clearly describes where the windows xp are located. I thought it could help in understanding what might be the problem with my system.

Right now, I think the reason why I cannot access my windows XP is that I cannot fully describe using bcdedit where it is located.

AddRAM said:

Another physical hard drive can not possibly get between 2 partitions on a totally seperate physical hard drive.

If you can get in to your machine, post us a shot of disk management.

AddRAM that is not totally correct. With XP, IIRC, and especially with older Windows OSs the system looks for the first Primary partition on each individual physical HDD and assigns letter to those first then goes back to DISK0 and looks for other partitions. Even it all the partitions on DISK0 are Primary you will get DISK0 Partition 1 as C drive then the first primary partition on DISK1 as D drive then back to DISK0 for all other partition then back to DISK1.

That is why I use Logical drive in an Extended Partition on all other drive except DISK0 in my systems.

Yes you can Re-Assign the driver letters with NTFS but you have to do that right from the start before you start installing things on the D drive.

The problem you are having is ALL version of Windows ALWAYS install things on the First Partition of the First Physical HDD found in the system. Even if you were to installed Windows to Drive Z on the 10th Physical HDD in your system it would still place files on the First partition of DISK0.

When you Installed Win 7 on the C drive of DISK0 it removed all the Windows XP Boot Files that WERE ON that partition and replaced them with the Windows 7 Boot Files.
Not sure how to proceed. But if it was my system I would just use a Virtual Machine software program and install XP in a VM.

No need to use old-fashioned XP-era bcd commands when there are automated modern methods like EasyBCD (free Download at bottom of page - no name or email required).

When installed to C if Win7 didn't configure a Dual Boot with XP on E, install EasyBCD to C to add XP by name, type and drive letter, accept boot files if offered, let it autocomplete.

If this fails post back the Easy listings page.

problem solved!

Thank you very much gregrocker!
Not in a million years will i think that i should set these :

Name: Microsoft Windows XP
BCD ID: {11725c7e-0c7e-11e2-a242-c6d67b574b38}
Drive: C:\
Bootloader Path: \NST\ntldr

My XP is in C?? anyway. I can now boot to my windows XP. This saved me a lot of man hours because all my work (software, database, environment for coding, etc) is in there.

EasyBCD autocomplete solved it!
Thank you EasyBCD!

Amazing.

Regards,
Deggen

You're welcome.

Be sure to keep your files backed up at all times, and an image of both OS's so you can reimage the HD if either OS becomes irreparable: Backup Complete Computer - Create an Image Backup

If you don't have a backup solution now you can sync your User folders to MS Skydrive for up to 7gb free with each Windows Live ID: Sync Any Folder to Your SkyDrive Account | PCWorld