removing VISTA (c:\) with win7 (J:\) - how???

[liquidmonkey]

hello,
i have recently installed win7 (which is AWESOME!!!) on J:\ and have my earlier VISTA (which is crap installed on C:\ as shown below.

HDD1 - 1TB
C:\ - 200gig has VISTA
D:\ - 800gig has just files

HDD2 - 1TB
J:\ - 200gig has win7
H:\ - 800gig has just files

note that each installation is on a separate PHYSICAL hdd!!!

my machine is DUAL BOOT (meaning i can choose which OS to boot at startup)
and i DO NOT have a cd-drive.

so now i am running win7 and am trying to rid myself of the VISTA install but when i tried to format C:\ (in computer management), the 'format' option was not available or rather windows (7) would not let me format. i was also UNABLE to format c:\ drive in 'my computer'

my guess is that there are some files that are being shared between the 2 OS's but i'm not 100% sure.
i also read that the boot.ini or bootsqm.dat might have specific boot information that if formatted, would render my PC non-bootable. is that true? and if so, how can one avoid this problem?

and, if i do somehow manage to format C:\ drive (VISTA), will my windows drive (which is drive J:\) have an impact on my PC since its J: and not C:???

i can't be the only one in this situation since sooooo many have tried win7 the last few months.


1 - how can i best go about removing that partition and/or formating that partition????

2 - is there anything i need to do before removing the older VISTA installation? are there any shared files that maybe the new win7 install would use? i'm referring to documents and settings folders and such.


hope that wasn't too confusing, thanks for reading it all and thanks for any input!!!

 

[sup3rsprt]

Hello liquidmonkey,

You can't format the Vista partition likely because the boot files are there. If you were to format it, your PC could no longer boot into Windows.

You can fix that by moving the boot manager to the Windows 7 partition. That is what the command-line tool bcdboot is for.

 

[iseeuu]

i can't be the only one in this situation since sooooo many have tried win7 the last few months.

True. Welcome to Windows Seven Forums, liquidmonkey. There have been a couple of threads recently on this topic:

http://www.sevenforums.com/installation-setup/23612-changing-system-partition.html#post255210

You might be able to glean some helpful info there.

1 - how can i best go about removing that partition and/or formating that partition????

As you have Vista and 7 on separate hard drives, I suspect if you remove the Vista hard drive, your system will boot to 7. If true, you should have a 100 MB boot patition in the front of the 7 hard drive and can change the boot drive to the 7 drive in the motherboard BIOS and boot to 7.

If not, if you do not have the 100 MB boot partition, I would suggest you use the "Drive Management Utility" in 7 to shrink the 7 partition to leave 100 MB at the front of the hard drive. Then remove (at least temporarily) the Vista drive and do a start repair or repair install to restore the boot partition and enable booting to 7.

2 - is there anything i need to do before removing the older VISTA installation? are there any shared files that maybe the new win7 install would use? i'm referring to documents and settings folders and such

There are no files shared between the Vista and 7 partition. After you can successfully boot to 7, you can return the Vista drive and use the drive space as you wish.

BTW you can change the drive letter of the J: drive to C: from the 7 "Drive Management Utility". I prefer to configure my dual boots so that what ever OS I am booting to at the moment is seen as the C: drive.

Cheers!

Robert

 

[SIW2]

If you remove the Vista HD, I doubt it will automatically boot into 7.

Disk Management won't shrink from the lower address spaces. In any case, you don't need to create a 100mb partition.

Boot into 7, Unzip this and move/copy bootsect.exe into 7 Windows\system32

View attachment bootsect.zip

Open an elevated cmd prompt and type: ( press enter after each command)

J:\Windows\system32>bcdboot c:\windows /l en-us /s J:


Then type :

J:\Windows\system32>bootsect /nt60 J: /mbr

Updated NTFS filesystem bootcode. The update may be unreliable since the volume could not be locked during the update: Access is denied.

\??\PhysicalDrive1

Successfully updated disk bootcode.


Don't worry about the ntfs filesystem bootcode not being reliable - you already have it on that volume. As long as you get the "Successfully updated disk bootcode" you will be fine.

Ensure 7 partition is marked Active.

Go into Bios and set the 7 HD before the Vista HD in the Bios boot order.

Reboot. Check in Disk Management that 7 partition is now marked as System.

 

[Night Hawk]

How did you install 7 on the second drive by usb key or mounting the iso image? One thought would be performing a custom install of 7 to replace the Vista installation on HD #0 and then use the Windows Easy Transfer option to backup the present 7 installation's files and settings to be restore on the Vista replacement installation of 7.

Why? and also a welcome to SF! liquidmonkey, you end up with a second working installation of 7 for other configurations or simply as one working main copy you can take your time while trying things out on the present installation.

If something goes wrong you can simply see that converted into one main storage drive later and still have a working copy of 7 on the first drive without ever touching the bios. When seeing more then one installation with one on the extra drive I added in for testing running into problems the second host I should install is now the actual host.

The replacement of Vista would still present the boot order by adding the first 7 install automatically into the new install's BCD store.

 

[chuckr]

If you remove the Vista HD, I doubt it will automatically boot into 7.

I doubt it will, too...

SIW2,
You got bootsec in sys32?
I ain't, need DVD.
EasyBCD put it there?
Or manual copy?
Or bcdboot cmd?
Thx

 

[Night Hawk]

When seeing the first host drive for the 64bit RC while still having Vista installed on another drive I ended up replacing Vista with the 32bit RC on the second of two matching drives later for an array with the first seeing the second 64bit install there. The entries for both of those two were still intact on the host drive when later reformatting the pair to setup a temp array to sse how 7 worked out there.

Once that was broken up and the host was unplugged along with the ohters the first saw another clean stand alone install of the 64bit(and a good move as it turned out) now the default. When replugging the other drives back I could boot into that installation with the first host back as default again.

The BCD works the same for 7 as it did for Vista where a new install of 7 would simply be used to replace Vista on the default drive. The other option would be unplugging the Vista drive long enough to perform a repair install on 7 insuring that as a stand alone drive. Once the Vista drive is plugged back in the Vista primary is simply wiped.

The problem then seen however is now either having a second 7 install one for the 32bit or 64bit there or a second storage partition on a drive that could set aside for storage if not something else. For a single large storage parition the Vista would be removed, the second would need to be moved forward afterwards in order to expand that to fill the drive back in again.

 

[SIW2]

Thanks, Chuckr,

I forgot to attach it to the post - done it now.

 

[Night Hawk]

Thanks, Chuckr,

I forgot to attach it to the post - done it now.

Substituting the letter H: for J: here I ended up seeing a different message on the screen for the 3rd 64bit RC still linked to the first host install's bcd there. Now to see if that drive is now bootable on it's own!

 

[liquidmonkey]

If you remove the Vista HD, I doubt it will automatically boot into 7.

Disk Management won't shrink from the lower address spaces. In any case, you don't need to create a 100mb partition.

Boot into 7, Unzip this and move/copy bootsect.exe into 7 Windows\system32

View attachment 27019

Open an elevated cmd prompt and type: ( press enter after each command)

J:\Windows\system32>bcdboot c:\windows /l en-us /s J:


Then type :

J:\Windows\system32>bootsect /nt60 J: /mbr

Updated NTFS filesystem bootcode. The update may be unreliable since the volume could not be locked during the update: Access is denied.

\??\PhysicalDrive1

Successfully updated disk bootcode.


Don't worry about the ntfs filesystem bootcode not being reliable - you already have it on that volume. As long as you get the "Successfully updated disk bootcode" you will be fine.

Ensure 7 partition is marked Active.

Go into Bios and set the 7 HD before the Vista HD in the Bios boot order.

Reboot. Check in Disk Management that 7 partition is now marked as System.

wow, great advice everyone, thanks!

just curious before i proceed...
will changing my c: drive letter to another one screw things up? i would need to change c: to x: (for example), then i could change j: (where win7 is) to c:.
would that solve everything?

also, i'm not going to do a reinstall of anything as i'm sure there is a work around as point out by the above quote.

to answer 'how i installed win7?' - i mounted the iso image in daemon tools and went from there.

and at the moment, as shown in 'computer manager', my c: (vista) drive is shown as 'system, active, primary partition' and my j: (win7) drive is shown as 'boot, page file, crash dump, primary partition'.

not sure if that last bit helps but i just want to add tha before i proceed with the above quote as they made the most sense to me.


again, thanks everyone!!!

 

[liquidmonkey]

thanks again everyone for the advice!!
i seem to have painted myself into a corner this time at it seems a tough problem to easily solve

since the win7 release is not that far away, i'll wait until i get the retail version and then just install that onto my c:\ drive and that should sort out all problems.....right?

i was hoping to avoid a reinstall but would have had to do it in 2010 anyway so i guess sooner is better than later


ps, for the time being, i've gone back into VISTA and uninstalled EVERYTHING i could to get HDD space back.

 

[SIW2]

Hi NH,

BCDBOOT.exe :

The command is bcdboot c:\windows /l en-us /s F:

There is no \system32 in the bcdboot command.

C:\Windows is the source, and /s F: specifies the target.


7 BOOTSECT.exe:

To be able to run bootsect.exe, you need to get it on your machine. copy it off the dvd (it's in the Boot folder) and into F:\Windows\System 32. Then run the bootsect command.

bootsect /nt60 F: /mbr


[Neither bootsect.exe or bcdboot.exe need to be in system 32 - you can run them from just about anywhere - it is easier to put them in system32 as that is where the cmd prompt opens to.]


Keep us posted as to how it goes.

Thanks, Chuckr,

I forgot to attach it to the post - done it now.

Substituting the letter H: for J: here I ended up seeing a different message on the screen for the 3rd 64bit RC still linked to the first host install's bcd there. Now to see if that drive is now bootable on it's own!

 

[SIW2]

Hi Liquid,

It is actually quite straightforward.

Boot into 7, Unzip the attached and put bootsect.exe into J:\ Windows\system32

http://www.sevenforums.com/attachme...0074-removing-vista-c-win7-j-how-bootsect.zip

Open an elevated cmd prompt and type:

bcdboot c:\windows /s J:

Then press Enter.

Next, type :

bootsect /nt60 J: /mbr

Then press enter.


That is it really.

Check in Disk Management the 7 partition is marked Active ( rt click it and select Mark as active).

Lastly, make sure 7 is the first Active partition Bios comes across - EITHER change the Boot order in Bios

OR swap the connectors to the motherboard - so the 7 HD is plugged in the socket where Vista is currently.

OR if you have a partition manager, just rt click the Vista partition and select Inactive.

Should take 5 mins. at most


N.B: I made it even easier - dropping the locale parameter /l en-us, it is not necessary.

 

[Night Hawk]

Hi NH,

BCDBOOT.exe :

The command is bcdboot c:\windows /l en-us /s F:

There is no \system32 in the bcdboot command.

C:\Windows is the source, and /s F: specifies the target.


7 BOOTSECT.exe:

To be able to run bootsect.exe, you need to get it on your machine. copy it off the dvd (it's in the Boot folder) and into F:\Windows\System 32. Then run the bootsect command.

bootsect /nt60 F: /mbr


[Neither bootsect.exe or bcdboot.exe need to be in system 32 - you can run them from just about anywhere - it is easier to put them in system32 as that is where the cmd prompt opens to.]


Keep us posted as to how it goes.

Thanks, Chuckr,

I forgot to attach it to the post - done it now.

Substituting the letter H: for J: here I ended up seeing a different message on the screen for the 3rd 64bit RC still linked to the first host install's bcd there. Now to see if that drive is now bootable on it's own!

That was a typo there! Later I ran into the "missing bootmgr" error but still simply need now to rebuild the BCD store.

When trying to mock the host 7 stand alone installation I copied the boot folder over once I had the bootmgr problem taken care of that came up with the "boot\bcd" error.

 

[SIW2]

bcdedit /export F:\Boot\bcd

That will export a copy of the bcd hive currently on the System partition into the F:\Boot folder.



LOL to the typo - easily done.

The bcboot command would have copied all those boot files across to F: for you. Saves doing it by hand.

 

[Night Hawk]

Which 7 installation should I be booted in? The first host install where the original bcd is found or the present default 7 on the actually 3rd sata drive.

The first host sata being the #1 sata until that gets removed also sees a boot entry there for the present default 7 as well as for the previous Vista and 32bit RC installations on the 3rd OS drive. The BCD store on the first sees 3 entries while the present was a stand alone which would seem to be the better of the two stores for this.

The present host sees the test 7 as H not F as seen with the original triple boot. Then I end up seeing "not a recgnised batch file command"? when simply going to type bcdedit at the elevated command prompt there.

 

[SIW2]

It will copy the bcd from the current System partition - so you will have all the same bcd entries on F:

So, assuming you want to copy bcd from System partition C: to F:
you can be booted into any o/s that sees C: as system.

 

[Night Hawk]

I think you just missed the update on what comes when entering the bcdedit command. The copy of 7 set as default sees itself as C since it was a stand alone from the start. I can still boot into it however since the first drive still has the entries from the previous installations.

 

[SIW2]

I can't follow your complex drive arrangement from the descriptions - but you should be able do bcdedit /export F:\Boot\bcd when booted into the first 7 host where the original bcd is found.

 

[Night Hawk]

Perhaps you need a grand tour! :roflmao: The bcd information along with a few screens here should give you a better idea. Note that the WD sata 1 being the first host for the triple is presenly in a close situation to the Vista drive we've been talking about since that will be removed or used as another temp storage device when the cables are swapped around. Sata #2 storage, sata #3 present host/boot, sata #4 destination for bcd store, sata #5 second storage.

Here's the bcd information with Xs substituting for the numbers on things for general reference.

PRESENT BCD STORE ON FIRST HOST:
Microsoft Windows [Version 6.1.7100]
Copyright (c) 2009 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
C:\Windows\System32>bcdedit /export f:\boot\bcd
The store export operation has failed.
The system cannot find the path specified.
C:\Windows\System32>bcdedit
Windows Boot Manager
--------------------
identifier {bootmgr}
device partition=C:
description Windows Boot Manager
locale en-US
inherit {globalsettings}
default {current}
resumeobject {xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx}
displayorder {xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx}
{current}
{xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx}
toolsdisplayorder {memdiag}
timeout 5
Windows Boot Loader
-------------------
identifier {xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx}
device partition=F:
path \Windows\system32\winload.exe
description Windows 7 RC64 3rd TEST - Sata 4
locale en-US
inherit {bootloadersettings}
recoverysequence {xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx}
recoveryenabled Yes
osdevice partition=F:
systemroot \Windows
resumeobject {xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx}
nx OptIn
Windows Boot Loader
-------------------
identifier {current}
device partition=C:
path \Windows\system32\winload.exe
description Windows 7 RC64 Host - Sata 1
locale en-US
inherit {bootloadersettings}
recoverysequence {xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx}
recoveryenabled Yes
osdevice partition=C:
systemroot \Windows
resumeobject {xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx}
nx OptIn
Windows Boot Loader
-------------------
identifier {xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx}
device partition=E:
path \Windows\system32\winload.exe
description Windows 7 RC64 - 2ND HOST Sata 3
locale en-US
inherit {bootloadersettings}
recoverysequence {xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx}
recoveryenabled Yes
osdevice partition=E:
systemroot \Windows
resumeobject {xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx}
nx OptIn
C:\Windows\System32>