Dual Boot Installation with Windows 7 and XP

Brink said:

Hello mdttb,

If you have a USB flash key drive with a motherboard that supports booting to it, then you could use it instead to load the RAID drivers from during installation.

I would if my mainboard USB ports worked.

I've been racking my brains and scouring the internet for any fixes and none have really helped.
It's kinda weird I can boot up and my flash key drive is found once windows loads, how ever my usb keyboard and mouse won't work at all with the 4 USB ports in back of the PC. I ran out and got a PCI USB Board so I can use my mouse and keyboard. From time to time I can get the USB ports to work but the fixes I found online only work once then the ports are hosed again. I did have the ports working with Windows 7 plugged in one of my Flash drives to get some files off it removed the drive by ejecting it and that's when the USB got hosed again.

The flash key drive isn't found when trying to boot into it and yes my board has the option.

Yes I have the correct settings in the Bios enabled for USB support and have messed around in the settings to try and get the ports to work with no luck.

If I remove the flash key drive while in windows to get it to work again I have to go into device manager and remove the USB Host Controller or restart the PC.

I did find one fix but I need the INF files off another PC that's running windows 7 and then copy the files and replace my INF folder from the donor. I don't have another PC I can install windows 7 on. Well I do but my wife will kill me if I install Windows 7 on her new laptop.

Hi Holtsaber,

It seems ntldr is on C, so you need the bcd entry pointing at C.

You might try using Easybcd to remove the existing XP entry, then add a new XP entry for partition C.

When you get the screenshots posted, we will have a clearer idea.

When I install Win7 and select XP from the boot loader my computer reboots. I tried repairing my XP install since I couldn't boot from it any longer. I ended up having to reformat, it was suggested to install 7 from within XP. This did not work, because I have x86 xp and x64 7.

I am trying again using your tutorial (which is how I did it initally, lets hope it works this time).

I have 3 hard drives, one for XP with a 10gig partition for a page file, one for 7 with same 10 gig for page file and a final drive I store non-program data on.

If XP first then 7 install doesn't work this time I'll try 7 then XP and as a last resort I will use the boot loader from SUSE 10. Never used it with 2 windows installs though.

Has anyone else had dual boot issues with a 64 bit and non-64 bit version?

I finally got everything installed. I think the problem was with the 32bit and 64bit OSes not getting along. Now if only I could get my paws on a cheap XP64.

As a result of your previous help I am about to install Windows 7 on my D drive (XP is already installed on my C drive). I believe I have read somewhere that the D drive must be empty but I notice that there are some files already in place - presumably installed originally by HP. I am attaching a copy of the entries. Is there anything that is likely to cause a problem? Would you recommend using the seperate spare drive rather than partitioning the C drive which does seem to add a complication? Many thanks for your continued help. This is all very new to me and I do not want to mess it up!

I currently have both Windows 7 and XP installed on 1 HDD (XP on a partition). Following your steps I got this for EasyBCD:

"This application has failed to start because the application configuration is incorrect. Reinstalling may fix this problem".

I have reinstalled both Net Framework 2.0 several times as well as EasyBCD with no luck at all. Is there an alternative method of booting back into Windows 7? I do not currently have access to my Windows 7 DVD either.

Hey Brink,

I had Windows 7 as my first OS. After 3 hours of google'ing I downloaded VistabootPro which booted me into windows 7, from there I used easyBCD to welcome back my boot menu. All is well regarding booting, now I just need to fix my media drive - filesystem is RAW.

Thanks for the reply. :)