New
#11
So many people complicate Windows 8.x/Windows 7 installs. This nonsense of unplugging one drive, installing OS via bootable media, then plugging back in original drive; downloading some bcd software to add boot entry...
You just need 1 GUI tool(Disk Management) and 2 CLI tools(DISM, BCDBoot)
Really, best way to dual boot Win8/Win7 on a machine that has Win8/8.1 is to do the install all inside of Windows 8.
In diskmgmt.msc, shrink HDD down to size you want your Windows partition, or if installing on another HDD, format that HDD as NTFS.
Then put in your Windows 7 media into Optical Drive.
Then manually install Windows, thusly:
Assuming: C: is OS partition, D: is OS2 Partition, and E: is Optical drive with Win7 disk.
Open admin level CMD prompt and type: DISM /apply-image /imagefile:E:\sources\install.wim /index:2 /applydir:
allow that to complete, you'll get a progress bar; after it says completed, type BCDBOOT D:\windows /d, and you'll get "Boot files successfully created".
after that, restart PC and you should be two boot entries, Windows 8.1/Windows 7 and just select what you want to boot too; in msconfig in either install you can select which you want to be default.
Edit: Have to add, the /index switch in the DISM, you'd want to change that depending on the version of Windows you are activating. For x64 install (which is the only one that'll install in UEFI mode that Win8 would come with), is usually: 1: HomeBasic, 2: HomePremium, 3: Professional 4: Ultimate.
x86 is usually: 1: Starter, 2: HomeBasic, 3: HomePremium: 4: Professional
But you'd want to verify that with DISM /get-wiminfo /wimfile:E\sources\install.wim