Dsperber, thanks for your detailed answer.
I don't want to eliminate any partition. I want to retain the old windows and be able to boot from it in the future.
You wrote "I don't see that the SSD Win7 partition is marked active", but the screenshot shows that the SSD Win7 partition (WIN7_NEW) is "System, Boot, Active, Primary".
How can I continue?
So you want to be able to boot to all three? WinXP, and spinner Win7 as well as SSD Win7?
Oops... my mistake. I was looking for the word "active" at the front of the list, like it shows on the WinXP partition. I didn't notice that it was further to the right in the list.You wrote "I don't see that the SSD Win7 partition is marked active", but the screenshot shows that the SSD Win7 partition (WIN7_NEW) is "System, Boot, Active, Primary".
Ok. So it IS active. And it's also "primary", which is required if you want to use it as the Boot Manager location going forward (which is what you accomplished when you ran Windows Repair).
The only thing left to do is to go into the BIOS of your machine and change the boot sequence hard drive list to show the SSD as #1. Then, when you boot it will be your "active" primary Win7 partition on the SSD (where a usable Boot Manager now lives, thanks to Windows Repair) that is read.How can I continue?
I don't really know what the state of the boot menu in your SSD Win7 partition is, but for sure at least the SSD Win7 partition will be automatically booted to if it's the only bootable Windows in the boot menu. If there are already more than one bootable Windows in that boot menu (from what you've already accomplished with EasyBCD), then you'll see them all and can choose what you want.
When you eventually do boot to the SSD Win7, it will be self-lettered as C. You can now do whatever else you want with EasyBCD, such as adding back the WinXP partition on the spinner as a boot menu choice, if it's not already there. Same with the old spinner Win7 partition, if it's not already there.
So you're really very close to being where you want to be. It's just that you really didn't need to do all that you've done, given what you were coming from and where you wanted to be. You didn't need to alter things to boot from the SSD (which is what then required making that Win7 partition "primary", and running Windows Repair or EasyBCD to plant a usable Boot Manager inside of it). You could have simply continued to boot from the "active" WinXP partition on the spinner, and simply used EasyBCD (while still running from either WinXP or the old spinner Win7) to add the copied SSD Win7 partition (still "logical") as an additional boot menu... and make it the default. Then you wouldn't have needed to go into the BIOS to change the boot sequence.
Note that still is an option if you want, to just stay with WinXP on spinner as the BIOS boot drive #1, and adding the SSD Win7 as an additional entry to that old original boot menu in the WinXP partition where the old spinner Win7 already also exists. All using EasyBCD to accomplish what you want.
In other words, I believe you currently have TWO AVAILABLE AND USABLE Boot Manager locations, in the WinXP partition on spinner, and in the SSD Win7 partition on SSD. Each of those has its own boot menu which can be configured by EasyBCD running on the booted OS, whichever Windows that is at the time. And thus you now have two choices in the BIOS as well... depending on whether you want to boot to spinner or SSD, since it really makes no difference now that you've said you want a 3-Windows boot menu no matter what.
At this point, there's really no difference which drive you care to start the boot process off of since you have TWO partitions (one on each drive) that is fully capable of initiating Boot Manager and a 3-Windows boot menu. Whichever you choose, that's what you need to set correctly in the BIOS, and use EasyBCD to get the boot menu that is presented to you by the Boot Manager you opt to use to show all 3 bootable Windows.
Ok, sorry for not following everything. But I now see that you theoretically ARE booted to the SSD, and since the Win7 partition located on that drive is marked "active" presumably you're running from that Windows.
If all this is true, I cannot understand why it's not already C. I don't believe you're actually booted to that Windows.
In my opinion, since it is the original spinner Win7 partition which still shows as C, then THAT is the version of Windows you're actually booted to... using the new boot menu coming from the SSD Win7 partition on the SSD, but still pointing to the original spinner Win7 location on the spinner.
Your new boot menu (in the SSD Win7 partition) has to be wrong. Or, you selected the wrong Win7 to boot from. Had you selected the correct SSD Win7, then it would show as C and not as G. C is the booted and operating Windows, so since the spinner Win7 shows as C then that's where you're actually running from.
Please run EasyBCD again (remembering that you've complicated things by now having TWO drives that are each bootable and which both have "active" partitions containing Boot Manager and a corresponding boot menu). This really isn't a good idea, as these kinds of issues are bound to arise.
Your best bet is to have only one drive that you plan to boot from. And that could still be the original spinner, if you're wanting to be able to run WinXP anyway... so the spinner is staying in your machine. If it were me, I'd go into the BIOS again and revert the boot drive #1 back to your original spinner. Now when you boot to it (i.e. to the Boot Manager and boot menu in the WinXP partition), it its boot menu will probably still show only the original two Windows... WinXP and Win7 on the spinner. Opt to boot to Win7 (on the spinner). Then run EasyBCD (from that Win7 on the spinner) and ADD a third Windows, i.e. from the copy of Win7 on the SSD. Period. End of story. Stick with the boot menu already on your WinXP partition and just add the new SSD Win7 location as a third bootable Windows (probably choosing it as your default).
Ideally, I'd also remove the "active" flag for the SSD Win7 partition to avoid confusion, but it's not critical. Forget about booting from the SSD. Just go back to booting from the spinner, and update that boot menu to have all three Windows entries in it.
I booted from the sdd. The boot menu was like the following. I tried all options. I am showing where each option leads to:
Earlier Version of Windows -> WINXP
Windows 7 -> WIN7
Windows 7 Professional -> WIN7_2
Windows 7 Professional (recovered) -> WIN7_NEW
Ok, but then why does %windir% lead to G:\Windows and the G partition says "Boot" in Disk Management?
I booted from the hard disk. The boot menu was like the following (WIN7_NEW was missing):
Earlier Version of Windows -> WINXP
Windows 7 -> WIN7
Windows 7 Professional -> WIN7_2
Having booted from the hard disk to my old WIN7 (and without changing anything), Disk Management is like this:
For some reason, the disk numbers have been changed (cf. https://www.sevenforums.com/installation-setup/369425-cannot-boot-ssd-after-windows-partition-cloning.html#post3063166). Why did this happen?
Am I now ready to run EasyBCD and add L as an additional boot entry?
See my posts on an almost identical problem thread, also produced by using the same EaseUS product you used.
In both your case and that case, the resulting drive letters got screwed up... and it's likely the disk numbers are part of the problem. I cannot vouch for EaseUS as I've never used it, but I also never will use it since I only use Macrium Reflect for these jobs of cloning Windows partitions from spinners to SSD, followed by Partition Wizard to then blow away the original Win7 partition and re-purpose it for "data".
Macrium Reflect marks the cloned target partition "active" automatically, but you must yourself get into the BIOS to change the boot sequence to show the SSD now as the first drive in the boot sequence in order to then be able to boot to that drive and get to Boot Manager... if for some reason you feel you want to boot to Boot Manager off of the SSD. You'll also need to use EasyBCD to transfer Boot Manager to that SSD Win7 partition in that case. But since you still want to have WinXP available, why do that? Just leave the WinXP as the "active" boot partition with the 3-Windows boot menu in it.
There are no problems if you use Macrium Reflect, and that's why I use it.
See my final suggestion on that other thread, where I suggest the very same "let's start over" solution. Don't waste any more time on this. Just use Partition Wizard to disappear the extraneous Windows partitions, going back to your original setup and original Win7 partition (if necessary, going into the BIOS to reset the boot drive sequence to return things to the way they originally were for the time being).
Then use Macrium Reflect "clone this partition" wizard, designating your existing Win7 partition as source and the now available free space on the SSD (which became available from deleting it using Partition Wizard) as the target for the operation. Then use EasyBCD to add the newly cloned SSD Win7 partition, and you're done. No need to change the boot drive sequence in the BIOS, as Boot Manager and boot menu in the WinXP partition is perfectly fine and now reflects the new SSD Win7 as a new available option.
That's what I'd do.
Using EasyBCD I added the entry "Windows 7 (SSD)" in the boot options for L. I booted and selected that option.
But C is still WIN7 and now WIN7_NEW.
I will try the Macrium Reflect solution.
If Win7 isn't booting as C then it was incorrectly installed from another OS and not by booting the disk, or you didn't select Auto drive letter when using another imaging program than the one which we recommend which makes it easy and automatic Macrium Imaging - Windows 7 Help Forums
You can either reinstall, reimage with Macrium at default settings, or stay with the letter you're stuck with because of this.
Nothing was said about a multi-boot with other drives. I was showing you how to make the new WIn7 drive independently bootable. Later you could add the other OS's from EasyBCD if you want to keep them and have separate licenses for each. You were to report back the need for these other partitions so we could help you sort out the jumble.
The OS drive should always be in DISK0 slot so that no future repairs or reinstalls can derail the System boot files to a preceding Primary partition.
Thanks, gregrocker.
In Macrium Reflect, should I change any "Cloned Partition Properties" (Drive Letter, Partition Type, Alignment)?
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