BCDEdit question: Dual boot Win 8 but now GUID of Win 8 took over Win

[RobertCGS]

I installed Windows 8 to a different hard drtve on my Win 7 system. I can boot Win 8 from that drive but can't boot Win 7 from the other. I booted to Win 7 recovery disk and checked BCDEdit. I immediately noticed the GUID identifier (yes that was redundent) were all the same for each Boot Loader. They should be different, so some how the Boot loader for Win 7 was overwritten with the identifier of Win 8. How do i recover from that?

 

[gregrocker]

Did you unplug the WIndows 7 drive when you installed Windows 8? If not it will always update the boot manager on the existing OS partition.

Did you try running Windows 7 Startup Repair - Run 3 Separate Times after confirming it's boot partition is still Partition Marked Active ?

To help sort this out let's first see a screenshot of Disk Management - Post a Screen Capture Image with both drives attached. It should be the same to create it using Windows 8.

 

[RobertCGS]

Well, I knew I should have waited a little longer but had a bright idea.
first I had run system repair 7 times, and ran bootrec /fixmbr and the /RebuildBCD. neither solved the problem. That is when i ran BCDEdit and found the GUID were the same. `After submitting the post I decided to remove the Win 7 bootloader entry altogether. I rebooted and dis a System Restore: although my Windows system partition was on D: restore restored C: I just rebooted, Windows 7 did not load. I let it go to Startup Repair which is attempting to fix issues. The Win 8 hard drive I removed so it would not get corrupted.

I can replace it and load to Win 8 and get you that screen capture as soon as the repair stops.

 

[RobertCGS]

Oh, and thank you for assisting me in this. I do appreciate it.

 

[gregrocker]

Remember to mark Active WIn7 partition or its System Reserved partition (if you have it) or the repairs will not work: Partition Marked Active

 

[RobertCGS]

OK, here is the data you wanted.


When you said "Remember to mark Active WIn7 partition ..." I thought the drive would be active automatically since it was the only OS on the only drive. (??) I had already removed my Win 8 hard drive.

 

[gregrocker]

You need to restore the System flag to the Win7 drive's System Reserved partition so that it is booting itself.

To do this, power down to pull the data cables on the other two drives.

Then boot the Win7 disk to run Startup Repair - Run 3 Separate Times,
until Win7 starts and holds the System Active flags on its SysReserved partition.

Now you can power down to plug back in the other drives, trigger Windows 8 drive when needed by using the one-time BIOS Boot Menu key at boot.

If this is not to your liking, install EasyBCD (click Download - no Name or Email required) to Windows 7, add Windows 8 on the Add OS Entry menu. You'll then have a Windows-style Boot menu, but both drives will still be independently bootable to come and go as you please.