Windows 7 installation doubt, plz clear it.

Hello friends,
I am planning to install Windows 7. I have 5 partitions in my hard drive. C and D are having WinXP. And another partitions for data. And ya, one more for Ubuntu. Now I want to install Windows 7 in C which is currently having WinXP. I want to do a clean install. So all the data will be deleted from C. But the problem is that, my boot.ini file is in that partition. So when I would clean install Win7 in C, and then reboot, the Win XP in D won't show, as the older boot.ini would be replaced by Win7's.

So my doubt is can I just move my boot.ini file to my D drive ? And do I need to move any other files along with the boot.ini ? And if moving the file is solution then, will I be able to choose between Win7 (C drive), Win XP (D drive) and the last Ubuntu option ? or is there any other solution/method ?
I don't know the solution to the problem. help my friends. I want to see all my OSe's at the time of booting and choose any one of them. And I am least concerned about the Ubuntu option. I don't mind even if it gets formatted. But I want my D drive's XP to be safe. I want that I get atleast two options to choose between C drives all new Win7 and D drives XP.

@Tews. Thanks for the tutorial. Well my doubt is still not solved. What I want to know is that will my computer ask me to choose the OS as it does not. Right now, my OS asks me 3 choices. Out of which two are XP's and one is Ubuntu. As I am having ubuntu , right now the booting process will be handled by the GRUB (correct me if i am wrong).. And when I install Win7, the GRUB will be replaced by the Win7's booting method. So what I want to know is that will I be able to see the other OS of my D drive ? And if no, then what should I do so that it shows the XP of D drive and if possible, even the Ubuntu ? Or do I need to install Easy BCD in Win7 ?

You need to uninstall the GRUB before installing Win7, then reinstall afterwards.

I would delete and format Ubuntu, make sure no drives except XP are marked active (data ideally should be Logical) then install Win7 to primary formatted partition. As last installed OS it should correctly configure the Dual Boot Menu updating the MBR in XP.

Now spend some time with Win7 to see its performance in that setting. Decide later if you really want the trouble of Ubuntu reinstall. Follow tutorials from Ubuntu to correctly configure GRUB to take control of boot menu.

If you have any questions during process, post back here a screenshot of your full Disk management map using Snipping tool in Start Menu, attach file using paper clip in reply box.

Coolness said:

gregrocker said:

You need to uninstall the GRUB before installing Win7, then reinstall afterwards.

I would delete and format Ubuntu, make sure no drives except XP are marked active (data ideally should be Logical) then install Win7 to primary formatted partition. As last installed OS it should correctly configure the Dual Boot Menu updating the MBR in XP.

Now spend some time with Win7 to see its performance in that setting. Decide later if you really want the trouble of Ubuntu reinstall. Follow tutorials from Ubuntu to correctly configure GRUB to take control of boot menu.

If you have any questions during process, post back here a screenshot of your full Disk management map using Snipping tool in Start Menu, attach file using paper clip in reply box.

No you dont have to uninstall GRUB when installing win 7. When you install Windows, it will automatically hide the GRUB/replace it with MBR. If you first formatted the ubuntu partiton, you can after installing Windows(s) install ubuntu back very easily.
And i disapprove the way you practically told him to get rid of Ubuntu.
Peace
And Happy Xmas!

Sorry, this is a Win7 Installers forum and some of us tend to give short shrift to hurdles to smooth installation of Win7. Ubuntu and RAID are two that present problems here every day.

I had about enough time to read the top Google result on Ubuntu dual booting which gave me the information I passed along above. Thank you for correcting it.

And a peaceful Happy holidaze backatcha

Hello friends,
I installed win7 and then I couldn't find any entries at boot time. It directly gets into win7. :-(
I also installed Easy BCD hoping it would get me back the entries to my drive D's XP. But now when i boot it shows me Microsoft windows entry (the one which i entered in EasyBCD) and another entry of win7. Win7 works perfectly, but the another entry of D's XP doesn't work. It shows me a blank screen and before that it gives a msg 4 a few seconds saying "C:\boot.ini invalid". And then a blank screen.

What should i do now? And suggestions so that i can boot back to my D drives winXP and also the C drives all new Win7?

Also note that my new win7 partition is now NTFS. Previously it was FAT. And all other partitions, except Ubuntu (obvious), are FAT including the D drives winXP.