Cleaning up Boot Menu

[Bluejaybee47]

Hi

This will be easy for someone though not for me.

I have been using Vista happily for some time but having trouble with updates for 3rd party products like Java and video drivers. Vista updates install fine except for XML updates.

Anyway when I couldn't get Medal of Honour to operate, with installer errors, I thought I would try going to XP. So I went through the dual boot routine, used EasyBCD and got Vista and XP Home dual booting fine. MOH then worked great.

Because my XP was activated on a different PC I only had 30 days before I tried to activate with Microsoft and they would tell me that it was already activated on the other PC.

So I decided to clean off XP and to load an old XP Pro which would not have activation problems. XP Pro did not instal cleanly so I decided to get rid of it also for the time being.

I cleaned up with EasyBCD so that the only bootloader entry is Vista with the correct drive and path.

However now whenever I boot up, I get Windows XP Pro as the default menu item followed by Vista. If I select Vista it boots properly. If I select XP Pro it goes to a second menu with XP Home as the selection. If I activate that I get some start up processing then “Staring Windows” then a stop error blue screen of death, something I have been glad not to see under Vista.

The control panel startup options only show Vista and unlike in XP control panel there is no edit option that would show me what was in the startup file.

Can anyone tell me how to clean up this inconvenient mess, please

Thanks

 

[mqudsi]

Hi Bluejay, welcome to NeoSmart Technologies.

Try EasyBCD | Bootloader Management | Reinstall Vista Bootloader

Does that do what you need?

 

[Bluejaybee47]

Thanks Mahmoud

I just did it again Reinstall Vista Bootloader is ticked. I hit "write MBR". I then restarted. Still same bad result.

Just so you can see that the loader should be clean, this is what EasyBCD shows

There is one entry in the Vista Bootloader.
Bootloader Timeout: 30 seconds.
Default OS: Microsoft Windows Vista
Entry #1
Name: Microsoft Windows Vista
BCD ID: {current}
Drive: C:\
Bootloader Path: \Windows\system32\winload.exe
Windows Directory: \Windows

Any further suggestions?

Addendum:

Also if I run BCDEDIT it just flashes and then disappears. Does that tell you anything about the state of the file?

 

[mqudsi]

You wouldn't happen to have the XP CD in the drive, would you?

 

[Bluejaybee47]

No nothing in drive. By the way I previously removed all XP files.