Want to make Win 7 System Partition DualBoot

Night Hawk · 24 Jun 2010

IF you performed a clean install of 7 without the Vista drive plugged in and saw 7 load up the drive is considered a bootable stand alone by itself. Different bios versions are used by each manufacturer where the arrangement of options can also be a bit different depending Award, Phoenix, AMI, or another bios used.

The user manuals are generally your best reference for going through the various options in the bios setup. Most boards often used by HP however are Asus models where the F4, F11, or F12 could be the choice. By going into the advanced section in the bios and disabling the HP brand logo screen the assigned keys should be displayed on the black post screen as you watch the memory total being counted and the drives being listed during the initial post tests.

On desktops with Asus boards F8 is generally the key assigned for bringing up the boot device menu that gives you the option for booting from a floppy, optical, or hard drive even usb flash drive on most newer bioses. Under hard drives all drives installed are listed. On the Gigabyte board in use here however once you select hard drive from the menu a second screen shows the hard drives installed.

In the bios for setting the default hard drive you will need to go through the boot order, Intergrated Periphals if seen, and possibly another section depending on the layout until you are in the onboard configuration area that also shows a hard drive item. When highlighted that should bring up the list of drives. The boot order is a different section entirely from the one you want.

Oldroser · 24 Jun 2010

I found this on the HDX18 Owners Lounge section of the notebookreview.com forums:

Also, I know I've read about some of you with dual hard drives who have set up a dual boot system. However I do not see an option in the bios to boot from the second drive. How are you guys getting around this? (HP support says, "Yep, the bios doesn't allow you to boot from the second drive. This should resolve your issue." WHAT?!

You still boot from the first hard drive, however a boot manager is installed either by you by using a third party boot manager from, say, Acronis or, in the case of Windows, the Windows installer actually installs a boot manager for you. Once the installation is done, instead of just booting to Windows Vista, you will first see a boring, usually text-based menu giving you a choice of operating system. If your second and third etc. operating systems are another physical hard drive, the boot manager will re-direct the boot sequence to that drive and partition.

The boring, text based menu is the Windows Boot Manager I described above.

Night Hawk · 24 Jun 2010

You see that when installing a newer version once it detects and automatically adds a previous version in as an option at startup. With both drives seen as stand alone installs however the Vista drive saw the entry for 7 while the fresh 7 install would need to see the entry for Vista added in there when made the default.

Besides being an overly tested free program EasyBCD can also rename the new entry from previous version of Windows to Windows Vista or Vista HP Drive 0 or whatever you want as well as being able to reduce the display time for the boot options menu down from the default 30 seconds as low as 3 seconds for fast boots. Most will prefer a 5-10 second setting for that however.

gregrocker · 25 Jun 2010

When you recover the MBR into Win7 using the steps given earlier, then see if one-time Boot Menu will give you a choice to boot Vista HD once you plug Vista HD back in.

If not, then your BIOS indeed does not support BIOS-managed dual booting so install EasyBCD 2.0 in Win7, remove Vista on the Add/Remove tab, then Add it back, Save, Restart.

Now you should have the dual boot menu AND be able to image only 7.

Night Hawk · 25 Jun 2010

That stinks if you find there's no assigned key for bringing up the boot device menu since that is far more valuable then repeat trips into the bios if you have need to boot from a disk(cd, dvd) or usb flash drive like trying out a new distro's live cd or using some other live cd tools like a drive partitioning program or other.

Going back and forth into the bios to change which will boot hard drive or optical for example can be annoying at times especially when setting up a dual or even multiboot of OSs. Having the options to select which OS while not having the boot options screen displayed long for speeding up the default OSs own load time is an asset however.

The entries you add in with EasyBCD are just as easily removed, or renamed, reassociated with drive letter changes. etc. actually having been a well written program.

gregrocker · 26 Jun 2010

The one-time Boot Menu on HP is normally accessed by tapping the ESC key at bootup.

And from what your describe, you have indeed accessed that menu, just not both HD's. Maybe they will both show after each has its own MBR.

Oldroser · 28 Jun 2010

gregrocker said:

Yes, the Boot menu you accessed when pressing ESC at startup is the one-time Boot Menu, which should give you a choice of HD's if both are registering in BIOS and System.

To make Win7 a System HD you need to write the MBR to it: Make sure it is still marked Active in Vista DIsk Mgmt, power down, Unplug Vista HD, set Win7 as first HD to boot in BIOS setup under Boot Order.

Now boot the Win7 DVD Repair console or Repair CD, click through to Recovery Tools list to run Startup Repair (not System Restore) up to 3 separate times with reboots until Win7 starts on its own.

Now plug Vista HD back in, boot computer, press ESC and see if you are given the choice to boot the Vista HD separately under HD's. Next, restart and confirm that Win7 starts up on its own,. Report back.

After I plugged Vista HD in and booted and pressed ESC it just said HD and I pressed it and Windows 7 started. That may have been a mistake.

I restarted and Windows 7 started. I had EasyBCD 2.0 installed in Windows 7. However, there was no Vista to remove on the Add/Remove tab. I did add it back, Save, Restart.

Now I have the Windows Boot Manager, only Windows 7 is at the top. I may be able to image only 7, haven't tried. But now Vista is no longer marked as System.

Oh, and Windows 7 still is drive F, very early in the process it was called C.

gregrocker · 28 Jun 2010

So do you have both OS's on the Dual Boot Menu, and each starts correctly when you click on it?

If Win7 is System then it should allow Win7 Backup to image it alone as you want.

Night Hawk · 28 Jun 2010

You now need to add the new entry in for Vista if you have that drive plugged back to see the new option for it appear on the boot options screen when starting up. First decided which drive letter will be used for Vista while booted in 7 and then proceed into the "Add New Entry" button in EasyBCD main screen there.

When selecting the OS and drive letter you can also name the entry the way you want it displayed on the boot options screen as you can see in the image when simply bringing down the drive letter option and the text line for retyoing the name before clicking the add entry button on the top right part there.

Once you click that simply open the view all settings tab to see how the new entry looks while in EasyBCD there. After the next time you restart the system you will then see the entry for Vista. That entry can also be placed above or below the 7 entry while you are still in Windows by opening up the Edit Boot Menu section where the up and down arrows are seen.

Oldroser · 28 Jun 2010

Vista didn't appear at all in EasyBCD, so I have already added it and it is the choice below Windows 7 default in the Windows Boot Manager.

However, my point is that in Disk Manager it no longer has System. So it appears that only one OS can be marked as System. Not quite what we were shooting for, independence of each. I don't think EasyBCD can fix this problem or you would have suggested it for Windows 7 previously. However, it has its Recovery partition so that should fix it should Windows 7 fail. Right?

I am afraid no more can be done and so we sadly come to a parting of the ways until I again post, which I don't do too often. Being on the internet eats up so much of your time I have found I need to stay away in order to catch up. And I have a huge list of things that need to be done. And some won't wait. I wish I had uploaded pictures of the beautiful roses I have that need tending and watering right now so I could post a "bouquet" here for you as I did here, if linking to another, local site is allowed: ODOT Vegetative Screening Site Plans for Tremont (West side of the highway embankment) | REALNEO for all

So, simply, many thanks. Wait. Found a way. Here you go! Catch this one!