Solved Auto-Hiding Unused OS in Dual Boot

[traceyw]

Hi

I have been trying to install Win10 on a dual boot system which includes all my apps and preferences etc. I have succeeded in doing this although I have one problem I just cannot find an answer for.

When I had a dual boot system with Win7 and WinXP whichever OS I was in, the partition for the unused OS was hidden. Currently when I am in Win7 the Win10 partition is visible and available for use and in Win10 the Win7 partition is visible and available for use -- and I would prefer that they were hidden. I even had to hide the small boot partition by removing the partition letter -- but how do I auto-hide the Win7 partition when I'm using Win10 or the Win10 partition when I'm using Win7. IS there any way of hiding the Win10 partition when I'm using Win7 and vice versa. There has to be a way of doing this otherwise the user would be running the risk of doing some unintended damage to the unused OS.

I would have thought the MS Boot Manager would be capable of auto-hiding an unused OS although I do recognise that Win10 is not due for official release until the end of the month. Nevertheless, I would have thought such a feature would already be part of Win10.

If anyone has any idea of how to hide the unused OS I would appreciate your help very much. Perhaps I shall have to use a third party boot manager. Whatever, I hope someone can help. Incidentally I'm posting this message here as I am using the Win7 boot manager.

Hope someone can help.
Tracey

 

[gregrocker]

You can remove the other OS's drive letter in Disk Mgmt so it isn't visible in Explorer. I don't know what damage you think could be done though. The other OS only appears as files to browse and isn't accessible to change anything without being an Admin.

The System Reserved partition should not have a drive letter in the first place.

 

[traceyw]

Gregrocker

I've seen that mentioned elsewhere on the web but hadn't thought anything of it as I didn't want to keep changing disk letters. Then you suggested the same thing and I sat back and thought about it and within seconds knew it was workable. I've now done it and the unused OS partition is now hidden in each OS. Thanks for your help in making me think about it. Its really obvious when you DO think about it -- but I hadn't until you suggested the same solution.

You say the boot partition shouldn't have a drive letter! Well mine did(!) which as I said in my first post I hid by removing the drive letter.

Anyway thanks again for your help.

Tracey