Tri-Boot:XP-Vista-Win7 - How to use HnS

[NetNut]

Originally Posted by kairozamorro

You know to this menu.lst it couldn't hurt to add the appropriate hide/unhide commands to the correct entries manually as well...

hide (hd1,2)
Hides the 2nd disk, 2nd partition
unhide (hd0,2)
Unhides the 1st disk, 2nd partition

I agree.. I am just being cautious..

[NetNut]

Originally Posted by Coolname007

True. But they also have a free 30-day trial, so you can try it out first... And is everyone so cheap, that they can't pay $35 to register it once, and never again have to? and then afterwards, after spending the few bucks, to have incredible capabilities at your fingertips? (EDIT: Of course that doesn't include the time before you register it, that you can use it for free...)

-Coolname007

Well normally the answer would be no for me, however I lost my job on Dec 3rd and I am still unemployed. I am trying to make my machine as useful as possible for learning different OS's while I am in the job market.

Now, don't get me wrong. I am not a noob; I just need to use this one monster PC I built to its full potential as it is getting close for me to start liquidating my other pc's and laptops. I have a family to take care of and need to keep the roof over their heads. My $$ is running out fast even though we cut eveything down to the bare minimums that were needed to survive.

Heck.. soon my Internet access may be gone too. It's getting very scary on the job front.

[NetNut]

I agree..

[Coolname007]

Good to know.

-Coolname007

[Terry60]

HI Netnut.
I'm happily hiding Vista and W7 from XP with HnS.
You need to tell UI.exe that the W7 disk is Vista so that it's included in the hides and unhides.
HnS chains to bootmgr to boot Vista(s), and you need to select multiple Vistas from that second menu.
In this case we're regarding W7 as another Vista so you need to undo the timeout(0) in the BCD using EasyBCD, so that the W7 option becomes visible in the second menu.
(this would also apply if you were running another copy of Vista)
I've changed my Hns menu to
1 Vista or W7
2XP
then the second menu (BCD's) to
1 Vista
2 W7
The defaults are 1 in both and the timeout(5) in both, so an unattended boot just takes an extra 5 seconds to go to Vista (my normal default daily OS)

[NetNut]

Originally Posted by Terry60

HI Netnut.
I'm happily hiding Vista and W7 from XP with HnS.
You need to tell UI.exe that the W7 disk is Vista so that it's included in the hides and unhides.

Did that originally and it is still set that way.

Originally Posted by Terry60

HnS chains to bootmgr to boot Vista(s), and you need to select multiple Vistas from that second menu.
In this case we're regarding W7 as another Vista so you need to undo the timeout(0) in the BCD using EasyBCD, so that the W7 option becomes visible in the second menu.
(this would also apply if you were running another copy of Vista)
I've changed my Hns menu to
1 Vista or W7
2XP
then the second menu (BCD's) to
1 Vista
2 W7
The defaults are 1 in both and the timeout(5) in both, so an unattended boot just takes an extra 5 seconds to go to Vista (my normal default daily OS)

When you say "W7 Option becomes visible in the second menu".. Second menu where? What application? HnS? If so than as I stated in my original post, I have set the W7 partition as a Vista partition to hide it during the HnS config.

[Terry60]

HnS is a top level bootmanager.
It chains to Vista's bootmgr to load Vista(s) (in this case W7 is regarded as another Vista)
It chains to NTLDR to load XP
The BCD (used by bootmgr) contains the entries for all the Vista systems (and W7).
This is the second menu in which you select between multiple Vistas (or W7).
Normally when you use HnS (with only one Vista), this second menu is suppressed by using timeout(0)
or by deleting all but the single Vista entry. (Boot menus don't get presented when there's nothing to choose)
It's the menu you see with Vista when you're not using HnS (the one you use EasyBCD to manipulate)

HnS only hides Vista(s) from XP, not from each other, nor XP from them.
This is because XP will destroy the restore points of any newer Windows OS it sees.
The other systems don't do any damage to each other or to any earlier system.

The HnS bootmanager is a customized Grub4dos, and as such it creates a menu.lst file containing all the grub commands executed for each choice in the menu.
It would be perfectly possible to modify this to change the logic of what gets hidden and unhidden and when it happens (other users have done similar things), but HnS contains no logic to do so itself (because it's not necessary to achieve the function for which it was written. i.e. protect Vista restore points from XP)
It is not a general purpose boot manager, just one developed for this specific need.

[NetNut]

Ok.. Well I gave up on HnS and removed it..
Now I am stuck with a Grub4Dos screen and I can not get to any of my OS's.

I used my Vista CD to perform a repair and nothing wrong is found. So I used Acronis to unhide the Vista and Win7 partitions, and set the Vista partition as active.

Unfortunately I no longer have my XP or Win7 entries in BCD.

Time to search the forums on how to correct this now..

[Terry60]

You shouldn't remove HnS except from inside Vista (because Vista will be hidden otherwise, and it's HnS that unhides it for you).
If you just run the UI and tell it you don't want it any more, it removes itself neatly and most importantly it renames the real Vista bootmgr (whilst HnS is active it masquerades as the Vista bootmgr by renaming the real Vista version to .HnS). If you deleted this, you deleted the real Vista bootmgr, hence your problems.
Now you've repaired the Vista boot (which you wouldn't have needed if you'd let HnS remove itself), just run EasyBCD, use the add/remove menu and add an entry for W7(using the Vista /Longhorn dropdown) pointing it to the partition that Vista calls W7.
Add an entry for XP (using the NT /XP dropdown) and make sure you point it to the "system" partition, not to the XP partition.
Read the sticky thread for a more detailed explanation.

[NetNut]

Originally Posted by Terry60

You shouldn't remove HnS except from inside Vista (because Vista will be hidden otherwise, and it's HnS that unhides it for you).
If you just run the UI and tell it you don't want it any more, it removes itself neatly and most importantly it renames the real Vista bootmgr (whilst HnS is active it masquerades as the Vista bootmgr by renaming the real Vista version to .HnS). If you deleted this, you deleted the real Vista bootmgr, hence your problems.
Now you've repaired the Vista boot (which you wouldn't have needed if you'd let HnS remove itself), just run EasyBCD, use the add/remove menu and add an entry for W7(using the Vista /Longhorn dropdown) pointing it to the partition that Vista calls W7.
Add an entry for XP (using the NT /XP dropdown) and make sure you point it to the "system" partition, not to the XP partition.
Read the sticky thread for a more detailed explanation.

Well I did uninstall it while in Vista and it did not unhide my Win7 partition and did not remove Grub4Dos.

I have since corrected the issue. Time to look at BootIt NG or back to Acronis OS Selector.

[Terry60]

If you were in Vista, then W7 wouldn't have been hidden by HnS. (It only hides things when you boot XP)
There must have been some stray (non HnS) consequences from whatever you were trying last night with ad hoc attempts to make it work.
Anyway, I'm not trying to lay blame, (sorry if my tone seemed so), just explain how it works, so you know what's going on.
If you look at the menu.lst on my system

# NeoSmart Technologies' Vista Hide 'n Seek Beta
# DO NOT MODIFY!!! YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!
timeout 5
default 0
splashimage=/vhns.xpm.gz
foreground 000000
background ffffff
title Vista or Windows7 (64 bit)
find --unhide /Vista.C.HnS
find --unhide /Vista.E.HnS
find --unhide /Vista.I.HnS
find --set-root /BOOTMGR.HNS
makeactive
chainloader /BOOTMGR.HNS
boot
title XP 32 bit
find --hide /Vista.C.HnS
find --hide /Vista.E.HnS
find --hide /Vista.I.HnS
find --remap-root /XP.D.HnS
find --set-root /XP.D.HnS
makeactive
chainloader /ntldr
boot
# All your boot are belong to NeoSmart!

You'll see that it would be a trivial change to make XP and the Vista/W7 entry mutually hide from each other, but since all Vista (or W7) systems are booted from the next menu in the chain (bootmgr's) which doesn't do any hiding, separating them from each other wouldn't be possible.

Good luck with your search.
Keep an eye on the forum. CG might develop HnS in any direction in future.

[kairozamorro]

You know, i'd try the registry zap now that you got your OSes booting correctly again and do not want to fiddle with HnS. It should only take a minute or two to setup and may work...

[NetNut]

Hi Terry,

Well I didn't change anything from last night. That is why I left this question in the forum. I did not want to make ANY changes to the menu.lst or any other setting until I fully understood the consequences.

Today I did duplicate the VISTA setting in the menu.lst, change the title to "Windows 7", no quotes, and change the unhide for the Vista and XP partitions to hide. All worked with the exception of constant MFT security identifier corruptions on my regular data partitions that are shared amongst all OS's.

This concerned me as it only started when Grub4Dos (HnS) was installed. So I removed shutdown Win7, rebooted into Vista and ran the UI.EXE and uninstalled HnS. Upon a reboot Grub4Dos ran and told me that it could not find the menu.lst file.

I was dead in the water at that point and pulled out my Acronis Disk Director recovery CD and booted it. I found that the Win7 partition was still hidden and the XP and Vista partition were properly set (primary/active/not hidden for XP, primary. not hidden for Vista)

I set the Windows 7 partition to "not hidden" and rebooted and grub4dos still came up. I rebooted into Acronis Disk Director and set the Vista partition as the active partition and rebooted. Vista came up and I ean EasyBCD and corrected my issues and entries.

I booted back into XP and looked for residual files. I found that in all of the OS's I had the .hns files and on the XP partition I still had the BOOTMGR.HNS file. I tried to delete the BOOTMGR file in XP and received an access denied error. I can not delete the file in XP.

So, I had to leave at that point as I had an appointment. I have not made it back home yet to attempt to delete the BOOTMGR.HNS file on the SP partition from within my Vista OS.

ALso.. I had one moe thing happen. The hiding and unhiding of the partitions triggered my Vista OS to authenticate itself again. It show authenticated in the system properties but my wallpaper states that my OS is not genuine.

Before you ask, yes.. It is a legal copy of Vista Ultimate. I received it on launch day at the Micorsoft kickoff in my city.

So, there are some issues here. My config is nothing strange and as no issues with corrupt security identifiers between the OS's when I was running Acronis OS Selector. I ran it that way for the past year.

My system is as follows:
Asus P5N32-E
Intel Q6600 Quad Core 2.4Ghz
2GB RAM (2 x 1GB)
Nvidia 8800GTS 640MB
3 x 300 GB Seagate 7200.10 SATA drives
1 NIC active, other disabled
Razor Barracuda AC-1 PCI audio
850 Watt PS
24" Dell LCD

XP Pro 32bit
Vista Ultimate 32bit
Windows 7 Beta

Addendum:

Originally Posted by kairozamorro

You know, i'd try the registry zap now that you got your OSes booting correctly again and do not want to fiddle with HnS. It should only take a minute or two to setup and may work...

I may do that. I need to read the technet post again. I thought that it stated there could be some side effects from making that change. I need to revist that article.

Addendum:

Thank you everyone for the suggestions and opinions. Unfortunately using HnS was not meant to be for me. So I will move forward with a different tool.

Have a great day!

[Terry60]

GIve the registry zap a try. It'll either work (result ! ) or it won't (like my system), in which case it sits there doing nothing, neither harm nor good.
The possible adverse consequences mentioned only occur if you install software for system (a) on a partition which you subsequently make unavailable to (a). Even in that unlikely situation, all you'd need to do would be (1) undo the zap (2) uninstall the app (3) redo the zap (4) reinstall the app on a drive you can still see.

[Makaveli213]

Does anybody even know if HnS works on Win7 at all?