Bootloader Issues

[HaGGardSmurf]

Hey guy's I wanted to try out Ubuntu so I made a live USB, installed it, but I wasn't paying attention and I installed grub (ubuntu boot loader) over my windows 7 boot loader.

Current Setup:

Now I have 2 HDD's in this PC. My 320 GB is my old hard drive and has xp still installed on it. I use XP for things here and there, but I also use the hard drive for storage.

My main HDD is my 750gb which has windows 7 installed on it. It's the one I installed ubuntu on (and messed up the boot loader)

I dont really want to have to reinstall windows, but I guess I will if I have to... (building a new PC)

Situation:

So right now, I boot off my 750gb HDD and it will just take me to a black screen, so I used the install CD to try and recover my bootloader but it installed the windows 7 boot loader over my XP boot loader (on my 320 gb hdd)

So now I boot off my 320 gb hard drive and it will boot windows 7 from my 750 gb hard drive(Because of the recovery I did with the install disk). I tried unplugging my 320gb hdd and using the install disk to recover my bootloader, but it didnt do anything to help. Still same issue, boot from my 750gb hdd and I get a black screen, windows doesnt load)

Now what I'm wondering is would I be able to make a small partition say 20gb (I have over 300gb of free space on this hdd...) and install windows 7 on it? Wouldnt that install the boot loader also? Then I could just delete the partition, and I would have my windows 7 boot loader on this hard drive? It would probably try and boot from the 20gb partition, but could I use my recovery disk to fix that?

 

[gregrocker]

Mark Win7 partition Active in order to recover the System boot-critical files so it will start on its own. Unplug XP HD to do this.

Boot Win7 DVD Repair console to access a Command Line to use Diskpart: http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/71432-partition-mark-active.html

After marking 7 Active, close Command Line, run Startup Repair up to 3 separate times to write the System MBR to Win7: http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/105541-startup-repair-run-3-separate-times.html

It would be much better to keep your OS's on separate HD's booted via BIOS so they remain independent and can come and go as you please. This is especially important with Ubuntu as GRUB can corrupt Win7.

So if you're able to start Win7, plug back in the XP HD and boot it via one-time BIOS Boot menu which is normally F8, ESC or DEL on Asus mobos.

Then reinstall Ubuntu to another HD booted only via BIOS Boot menu to keep it separated.

 

[HaGGardSmurf]

Thats the thing, I have 2 seperate HDD's because IMO its much easier to use the bios to select what to boot (selecting what HDD)

Using disk management I cant make my partition active. Hell I cant even make the partition on my 320gb HDD active. I'll use my recovery disk later tonight to attempt to make it active.

So when you say run it 3 times (I read the link) do you mean type:

bootrec /fixmbr
enter
bootrec /fixboot
enter
bootrec /fixmbr
enter
bootrec /fixboot
enter
bootrec /fixmbr
enter
bootrec /fixboot
enter

Or do you mean I fix mbr and boot, then power off, and back on (boot recovery cd) then fix mbr and boot again, etc...?

 

[Hopalong X]

Read the tutorial and follow as Greg suggested: http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/105541-startup-repair-run-3-separate-times.html

Mike

The simplest way to make these changes is to do what is referred to as a startup repair it's a process that will write new boot files to the selected OS and it will then be able to boot independently; or in other cases you may want to rearrange / change the partition structure, you can use a startup repair to correct this also.

The trick is that sometime and in certain situations it becomes absolutely necessary to do as many as 3 separate startup repairs with a system restart between each repair to completely write boot files to the "new" location and if the process is interrupted or not completed you will be right back where you started, with a PC that will not start-up at all.

 

[gregrocker]

Thanks, Mike. May not always be clear these are links to tutorials without an underline.

 

[HaGGardSmurf]

I made it active, that went fine (I'm pretty sure it was active before)

I did fixboot then fix mbr
rebooted
tried again
rebooted did it multiple times
fixboot fixmbr
fixboot fixmbr
fixboot fixmbr

and nothing... Still doesnt work.

Is it because I didn't do it exactly as was said? (IE: fix once, reboot, fix again reboot, fix again?)

I'm fairly certain My boot loader was completely wiped out before when installing linux. (Grub was installed completely overtop)

 

[gregrocker]

You are running line Commands instead of Startup Repair itself.

You need to boot into DVD Repair console or Repair CD to run Startup Repair. The tutorial on how to do this is here: Startup Repair - Run 3 Separate Times

 

[HaGGardSmurf]

Ohh, I was supposed to use the startup repair?

I thought I was supposed to use fix mbr and fix boot 3 times?

Last time I tried startup repair it said something about windows being unable to detect any problems. (This was a few weeks ago, before I did the make active thing)

If it says it failed to fix anything should I restart and do it again for a total of 3 times? Or does it need to give me some confirmation of it fixing something.

 

[gregrocker]

Make sure the 100mb SysReserved partition (if you have it) or the Win7 partition itself are marked active: http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/71432-partition-mark-active.html

Then boot the DVD Repair or Repair CD, accept any offered Repair. If it doesn't start Win7, boot back in to run Startup Repair 3 separate times with reboots.

If you want a picture of what you are marking Active, use free Partition Wizard bootable CD. There is a feature on the DIsk tab to Rebuild MBR which also works quite well you can try first before Startup Repair.

 

[HaGGardSmurf]

My win 7 partition is marked as active.

I'll try in a little bit, I got some things I'm in the middle of right now.

Anyhow, since its been marked active already, I should go into the repair tool, let it try and diagnose any problems, and make any fixes?

Then try and boot, if windows does not boot then I need to do the 3 recovery thing?

 

[HaGGardSmurf]

Tried the repair tool, rebooted it didnt work.

Then I did the repair tool, reboot (to dvd) repair tool, reboot (to dvd), repair tool, reboot. That didnt work.

Each and every time I tried to use the repair tool it'd search for a second or two then tell me it couldnt find a problem:

What else can I try?

The only idea I have is:
Maybe make a ~100gb partition on this hard drive, and install windows 7.

Then what I am thinking is if I were to delete this 100gb partition, I'd have the boot loader on my hard drive but it'd be looking for the necessary files in the 100gb partition to boot. It wont find them (after I delete the 100gb partition) so it will fail to boot. Now if I used the recovery disk, would it make the boot loader look in the right spot (my main windows 7 partition which will now be shrunken down to 650gb, I'd just expand it back to the full 750 after.)

Would the boot loader be installed in the 100gb partition I make or is there kind of a 'boot' partition on hard drives where the boot loaders are stored? Sorry, I dont know how all this boot stuff works... :S

I'm at the point where I might just move most of my data to my 320gb hard drive, reinstall windows on a 100gb partition, and move all my stuff from over once its all moved just use disk manager, and delete my 650gb windows 7 and expand my 100gb back to 750gb. (Essentially reinstalling windows...)

This is starting to get to be a pain, I need to use XP but have no access to it since the recovery disk overwrote the boot loader the first time I tried to recover it. (XP is stored on my 320gb HDD, and currently to get into windows 7 I need to boot my 320gb hard drive, it then starts up windows 7.)

 

[mjf]

Hey guy's I wanted to try out Ubuntu so I made a live USB, installed it, but I wasn't paying attention and I installed grub (ubuntu boot loader) over my windows 7 boot loader.

As you probably know bootloading is a little different in Windows 7 from XP.
Are you referring to the bootmgr in system reserved or winload.exe in
c:\windows\system\winload.exe

 

[HaGGardSmurf]

Well when you install ubuntu you can do it automatically or manually. I did it automatically, it resized my windows 7 partition down to about 600gb and made a new 150gb partition for ubuntu.

The install didnt work, or something I honestly cant remember, but I ended up using disk manager and formatting the ubuntu partition, and was going to reinstall. So I got to the install part and I was forced to manually install (otherwise it was going to shrink my windows 7 partition down again and make a new partition)

Anyways, long story short, I selected all the settings, and there was a setting about where to install grub (ubuntu boot loader) and I selected windows 7, when I should have just selected my 750gb hard drive. (I had an option for windows 7, windows xp, western digital 750gb, and seagate 320gb)

So anyways when grub would load up it lists the things to boot, ubuntu, windows 7, and windows xp.

When I would select windows 7, it would just reboot grub. (Which makes me think grub overwrote my windows 7 boot stuff) I used the recovery disk, and it said it fixed all boot problems. What it had done is overwrote my XP boot info (which was on a separate hard drive) with windows 7 boot info. So if I selected windows xp in grub my windows 7 would start.

Thats where I'm at now. To load windows 7 I need to boot from my 320gb hard drive. Which means I currently only have access to windows 7, and not XP...

Sorry for the long reply's but I'm just trying to explain my problem exactly to you guys, and how it happened.


Honestly I am wondering if It'd be easier to do a fresh install? I am building a new PC (just waiting for the ram to arrive at my house from newegg) Both hard drives are going in the new PC. (The only things I really need to save are my movies tv shows, apps and music, which amount to about 250gb)

 

[gregrocker]

GRUB will often corrupt Win7 if it is on the same HD. It is much better to install your OS's to separate HD's and boot via the BIOS Boot Order or one-time BIOS Boot Menu so there is no need for GRUB or Windows-managed multi-boot and all HD"s remain independent to come and go as you please.

If you want to recover XP now, you'll need to boot the CD to run a Repair Install. It will overwrite Win7's MBR but that appears to be toast anyway thanks to GRUB. Then copy out your files using XP, or the Win7 DVD or REpair CD using this method: http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/93347-copy-paste-windows-recovery-console.html

Tips to get a purrfect Win7 reinstall based on hundreds done here: http://www.sevenforums.com/installation-setup/125874-re-install-windows-7-a.html#post1086729

Separate disks, of course...

 

[HaGGardSmurf]

So do you think what I suggested will work?

What I'm thinking:

1) Use disk management create a 300gb partition (only have 350 gigs of free space on this HDD)
2) Install win 7 on the 300gb partition
3) Whatever I want to keep move as much as possible to my 320gb hard drive
4) Boot into the new windows 7 install
5) Move whatever data would not fit on the 320gb hard drive to my new win 7 install
6) Delete the old partition
7) Expand my 300GB partition to the full size of my hard drive
8) Start moving data from my 320gb hard drive back onto this one
9) Fix my XP boot loader

Then I'd essentially have reinstalled windows 7 without disturbing any of my data, then just move the data into my new partition, and remove my old partition. Will this work, or is it not possible to access another partition on a currently active hard drive?

 

[gregrocker]

You really need to wipe the HD which had GRUB on it as remaining code can itself corrupt Win7.

You can copy out your files using WIn7 DVD or Repair CD: http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/93347-copy-paste-windows-recovery-console.html

If you don't have space to move all data off the HD to wipe it before reinstalling Win7, then use free Partition Wizard to Resize the HD partition from the left, create New NTFS Primary partition, rightclick>Wipe the partition with zeroes. Install Win7, then copy data into Win7 and to other HD until the remaining space is empty, then wipe it with zeroes before copying data back in if desired.

Here are the steps to repair XP: http://pcsupport.about.com/od/operatingsystems/ss/instxprepair1.htm
If it won't run Repair Install, use Command Line to run bootrec.exe /fixmbr and /fixboot

 

[HaGGardSmurf]

Well I have about 60 gigs free on my 320gb hard drive right now, and can clear another 160gigs

Which would give me about 220gb
I have about 250gb of stuff I'd like to keep.

I guess I can copy about 200 gigs worth of stuff to the 320GB hard drive, then boot into the new win 7, move it all. Then copy the remaining stuff once done delete the first partition.

Is Free partition wizard better than windows 7 disk manager? Seems like I can do the same thing with just the disk manager.

 

[gregrocker]

If you can boot into Win7 to use Disk Management then why would you need to reinstall?

If you're unable to boot into Win7 then use Partition Wizard bootable CD to shrink existing partition to install Win7. If you do this, then I would shrink the existing partition from the left so your new install is in first position.

You also need to wipe the HD with zeroes but if you can't move all the data off externally or to another computer on your network, then I suggested you use PW CD to wipe the new partition before installing Win7, then after install move the rest of the data off to wipe the remaining space.

 

[HaGGardSmurf]

Well like I've said multiple times in this thread.

My repair disk over wrote my windows xp boot loader. Thus I boot my 320 gig hard drive and it boots my windows 7 install which is on my 750 gig hard drive.

If I fix XP, then I have no way to boot win 7. Thus why I want to reinstall win 7 on my 750 gig hard drive, and fix my xp boot loader on my other hard drive.

My brother has an external hard drive but I'm fairly certain he has all his stuff backed up onto it because his macbook pro died on him the other day. I'll see if I can borrow it for a little bit to backup all my stuff, then completely wipe this hard drive.

 

[gregrocker]

If Win7 is booting with the XP HD plugged in, then it can be repaired.

You need to mark Win7 partition Active in XP Disk Management, then power down to unplug the XP HD, change the cable to Win7 HD or set Win7 HD in BIOS setup to boot after DVD drive, then boot into DVD Repair console to run Startup Repair 3 times.

If this fails, open a Command Line from the DVD Recovery Tools list, type:

DISKPART
LIST DISK
SELECT DISK # (replace # with Win7 #)
LIST PARTITION
SELEcT Partition # (replace # with Win7 partition #)
ACTIVE
EXIT

Now return to tools list to run startup Repair again 3 times.

If these Repairs fail, as a last resort I would boot free Partition Wizard bootable CD, post back a screenshot if you can of the drive map, confirm Win7 partition is marked Active, then from Disk tab select Rebuild MBR on the highlighted Win7 HD.

When Win7 starts, plug back in XP to run a XP Repair install with Win7 HD unplugged.