Tripple Booting XP + VISTA + XP

Azur746

Member
Hi, I am trying to tripple boot xp + vista + xp.
I have attached detailed screenshots of the current state the drives are in.

I had xp and vista duel booting ok on disk 0 (see screeshot attached)
I the added anotrher harddrive, and installed xp on a primary partition on it.
I restarted, and now only both XPs are displayed in the bootscreen, and not windows vista that was there before.
Disk 1 is the new hard drive that has been added to the system. (screenshot)

In the boot.ini file I can only see two XP entrys and not anything for vista.
I have uploaded the current boot.ini file that is from the C partition containing the first installation of XP that currently appears as the second option on the bootlist when starting the computer. The newly installed T partion of XP appears first.

The solution that I am trying to reach is to have XP(C partition), vista (K), and XP(T) displaying when I start the system in the boot screen/menu so that I can select any of them, and they all load the OS fine.

If anyone can help me or suggest something that can help I would be very greatful.

thanks, Azur
 

Attachments

  • system config.JPG
    system config.JPG
    246.7 KB · Views: 4
  • system config 2.JPG
    system config 2.JPG
    264.3 KB · Views: 6
  • boot ini file in C - XP installation partition 40gb.txt
    304 bytes · Views: 1
Hi, I have read some more threads, and information on using EasyCDB now.
I think that this is the right way to go about solving the problem..

1) backup settings using easy cbd, to save the current bootloader.
2) EasyBCD -> Bootloader Management -> Reinstall Vista bootloader.
3) re-boot, should hopefully now see (xp home sp3 - existing xp before the instalation of the new one on the T partition) and the vista one on the boot screen/menu.
4) At that point i would
5) boot into existing older xp (C partition) load easycbd, go to the add/remove entries page-select the vista bootloader and attempt to add an entry for the new windows xp, on the T partition/drive
to the vista bootloader ... 'Name' Windows XP-NEW, 'Type'Windows NT/2k/XP/2003 ???

Now at that stage hopefully I should see both xp instalations on both drives, and the vista installation, as options to boot from.

That is the best case scenario that i can see at the moment.
An issue that I have is that on another thread I read that "You have to make sure that the files for the XP Boot are on thh Vista drive. The NTLDR and the NTDETECT have to be on the Vista drive.
After that just add XP thru the Add/Remove Entries and it should work."


Do I need to move any NTDLR and NTDETECT files to the vista partition (K) to get the vista BCD bootloader to recognise that xp installation on the new drive (Disk 1 - on the screenshots) ?
And If so, How do I go about doing this?

Any help or comments are very appreciated, thanks
 
Hi Azur, welcome to NST.
Your system was originally XP (the C:\ disk), and when you added Vista in your dual-boot, you put it in a logical drive.
Windows cannot boot from a logical drive, so Vista installed its bootmgr and BCD to the XP partition, automatically detecting XP and adding an entry for it.

This is MS's preferred way of dual booting (new after old), because the new system is designed to be backward compatible with previous systems.

However, installing another XP, means that XP (which is not forward compatible and doesn't have a clue what Vista is) has reverted your boot process to use NTLDR instead of bootmgr. This will only recognize and boot your 2 XP systems. You can see in boot.ini that it's already done that for you. (NTLDR cannot boot Vista)

You need to repair the Vista boot process by booting the Vista DVD and seleting "repair your computer" "startup repair" to put Vista back in charge again. (This only fixes one thing at a time so will need to be done 2 or 3 times to make the Vista boot fully functional again)

You don't need to copy any XP boot files to Vista. XP is "system" so the boot files are already there.

When Vista is back in charge you will have a 2 stage menu.
You select Vista or XP from the 1st menu (Vista's BCD), and if you choose XP, it will chain to NTLDR which will read boot.ini and give you a second menu to choose between the 2 XPs.
The BCD is not designed to choose between XPs, you'll have to do that in the 2nd menu.

Please read the sticky thread and its embedded links for more information.
 
Last edited:
Hi, thanks for that information, I will try now

, Azur

Addendum:

Yes that has worked fine and just as you said. I only had to run the startup repair option once through on the vista dvd, the next times it said try removing any usb connections or somthing like that.

thanks again, Azur :grinning:
 
Last edited:
Back
Top