new to easyBCD 2.0.2

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Ok, first of all I've read quite a few posts but haven't found some answers yet.
I can't get win xp to boot. Its on a separate drive from win 7 which I'm now using. I read about "how to install vista/7 first then xp". I did all that, except xp doesn't load like it says it should. Therefore, I couldn't install easyBCD onto xp. I tried installing it on win 7 to see if that would help me. Assuming it might...I don't really know how to set-up easyBCD. I'm on the "Bootloader Setup" option, and I thought I should write the MBR for XP. However, a message comes up asking if I'm sure I want to do that...and I'm not. LOL
I've tried repairing the xp install, and even repairing win 7 (altough it tells me it didn't find a problem). I'm still getting the windows boot options instead of easyBCD when I try to boot, so I'm sure something's not right.
Any help? Please. Or should I just return my computer to the store. :wink:
 
Just run EasyBCD on W7
"add new Entry"
windows Tab
select XP from the dropdown
tick the "automatic" box
click the "add" button

job done

look in "edit boot menu" and you'll see that you now have two boot options in the BCD
(while you're in there you can customize the names, change the display order, change which is the default, shorten the wait time etc. if you're so inclined)
 
Ok, thanks! But, when I reboot, it goes to the windows selection for win7 or xp. It doesn't seem that easyBCD is functioning at startup. Also, when I do select xp, it sticks at the xp startup screen (you know where the little bars are supposed to move across; they don't). Makes me think that there's a problem with the xp boot regardless of easyBCD's instructions.?. I thought maybe easyBCD would fix that boot problem but to no avail. Any further suggestions much appreciated!
 
EasyBCD is not active at boot (or any other time).
It's just an app.
If you run it, it just does what you ask it to.
In your case, you asked it to add an entry in the BCD to locate and chain to the XP boot loader.
That entry is now in the BCD, and EasyBCD will do nothing else unless you run it again for some other purpose. You could uninstall it now if you wanted. The BCD entry it created for you will still be there.
If XP is hanging where you describe, you have passed through the boot stage, and no amount of tinkering with the BCD will affect it.
Did XP ever boot after you installed it ?
 
Ah, ok. Well, no I can't get XP to boot at all. I've re-installed it, repaired it, disconnected the other (win 7) drive, used 3 different XP install discs. It always hangs at the same place.
(If its not something easyBCD is going to help, I feel bad bothering you!) However, I do really appreciate the info... Thanks.
 
The Install runs, (including auto-reboots) right through to completion, but then won't boot ?
(Or the install fails at the same point without completing ? )
 
Can you post a Disk Management screenshot and your EasyBCD "view settings" (detailed mode) text to see if that reveals any clue. (how-to details in the sticky if needed)
 
disc management and BCD view settings

Here you go...
 

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win 7-xp dual boot on two hard disks

welcome aboard.

Ok, first of all I've read quite a few posts but haven't found some answers yet.
I can't get win xp to boot. Its on a separate drive from win 7 which I'm now using. I read about "how to install vista/7 first then xp". I did all that, except xp doesn't load like it says it should. Therefore, I couldn't install easyBCD onto xp. I tried installing it on win 7 to see if that would help me. Assuming it might...I don't really know how to set-up easyBCD. I'm on the "Bootloader Setup" option, and I thought I should write the MBR for XP. However, a message comes up asking if I'm sure I want to do that...and I'm not. LOL”

“Ok, thanks! But, when I reboot, it goes to the windows selection for win7 or xp. It doesn't seem that easyBCD is functioning at startup. Also, when I do select xp, it sticks at the xp startup screen (you know where the little bars are supposed to move across; they don't). Makes me think that there's a problem with the xp boot regardless of easyBCD's instructions.?. I thought maybe easyBCD would fix that boot problem but to no avail. Any further suggestions much appreciated!”

I think the problem that you are having with Windows XP booting is that you have its boot files on the second hard drive. Either that or Windows XP is confused about which is the active boot partition.

Installing a dual-boot between one Windows 7 and one Windows XP should be really quite trivial. Doing it across two hard drives is just a tad more complex.

The normal setup would be to have Windows 7 on the first hard drive ( hard drive zero). There should be a primary 100 megabyte NTFS boot partition at the front of the drive. Then there should be a larger primary NTFS partition that contains the Windows 7 operating system. On the second hard drive there should be one partition of say 18 GB or more for Windows XP. This partition can be either a primary partition or a logical partition within an extended partition. My personal preference would be to go for a logical partition. In any case the Windows XP boot files should end up in the 100 MB partition at the front of the first hard drive.

You might look and see where your BOOT.INI and NTLDR files are located. They should be in the boot partition on hard drive zero. I prefer to run Easy BCD out of Windows 7 because it is exceedingly easy to repair the Windows 7 boot when it gets broken by loading other operating system using the Windows 7 repair disk.

You say you are getting the selection for Windows 7 or Windows XP. If you installed Windows 7 first and then Windows XP this selection menu must be coming from the modification of the Windows 7 boot loader done by Easy BCD. The only way you’re going to get this selection menu from Windows itself is by installing the older operating system first and then the newer.

Regarding your question on the boot loader setup option you want to click on write MBR. This is the step that allows Easy BCD to take over the boot loader duties on the system. Sometimes I’ve also found it necessary to click on “BCD backup repair” and select the radio button for “re-create / repair boot files”.

Installing Windows XP after Windows 7 or Vista:
http://neosmart.net/wiki/display/EBCD/Installing+XP+After+Vista

Note that the guide above does not discuss how to install the two operating systems on two separate hard drives. The guide assumes you’re going install both on a single hard drive.

Addendum:

Okay I just saw your hard drive picture. You have 3 hard disks of 18, 372 and 465 gigabyte. Which of the hard disks contains Windows 7 and which contains Windows XP?
 
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That XP entry isn't "auto". It looks like you've manually specified the drive, then gone into advanced mode and edited the drive letter again.
Did you try what I said and use auto-config at any time ?
Where is XP, on the drive you've labelled Maxtor F, or on the real F (in W7's mind) ?
Disconnect the other drives and install XP to the target drive, using the "custom" option at the beginning of setup to delete and format the space. (full not quick format)
If you can't get XP to boot then, either your HDD is bad or the install media (unless you're getting some explanatory message of why it's failing).
You can check the former by trying to install XP in some space made on the other HDD. The latter you seem to have already covered with multiple XP CDs.
 
Alright, I have a few things to try now. I'm gonna write down what I did; in case it doesn't work, so I can tell you both.
Terry, I did do the auto-config, but not since i've re-installed xp.
Both of you seem to want to know which install is on which drive. Let's see. Win 7 is on C: (which has another partition D:smile:. XP is on F:. Those are both internal drives. Maxtor is an external drive lettered F: and G: (its actually G:-I don't know why the F: is listed on the disc management. I didn't re-name anything that I know of.)
Another thing... I'm not sure why two win 7 installs show up. I did re-install win 7, but I either deleted the first or formatted before installing the second one (I can't swear which one I did.) Is there any chance that's screwing me up?
 
That's not two W7s. It's just telling you the location of the bootmanager, and the location of the OS (in your case the same place)
 
Well, not havin' any luck. I tried writing MBR for XP (and I repaired the boot files). Didn't fix the boot problem. I disconnected the other drives and tried installing xp to the 20GB drive. Didn't work. Now I've made a 20GB partition on my C: drive of the 400GB drive (I think its called G:smile:. And the XP install doesn't even see the HD now.
Perhaps it would help if I told you why I'm even trying to install XP... I have an old HP PSC 500 printer/copier/scanner with parallel input. Win 7 can't install the scanner drivers. I've been through lots of posts trying to get it to scan; to no avail. It worked just fine with XP, so I hate to trash it.
Anyone want to stab at a fix for my problem? Short of buying a new all-in-one?
I even tried installing Ubuntu (which didn't install the scanner drivers), and I know next to nothing about linux software anyway.
 
How old is your XP CD ? Does it include SP2 ?
If it's not that new it won't contain any SATA drivers.
You can get some from your mobo support site, put them on a floppy disc, and pre-load them with F6 at the beginning of the install.

btw "Install XP boot loader" is for one purpose only - abandoning Vista or W7 completely and returning to an XP only single boot.
You should never use it on a system with Vista or W7. It makes them unbootable.
 
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I think it would be best to reverse the order of the two internal hard disks so that Windows 7 is on hard disk zero. I think if you just swap the two data cables you should be able to accomplish this.

I did a test of today with a second hard disk and successfully booted Windows XP on the second hard disk. I have Windows 7 and many other OS’s on my 1 GB hard disk and Windows XP on an 18 GB IDE disk from 1997. Adding the entry to boot into the Windows XP on the second hard drive in Easy BCD was a snap. The only difference between doing the automatic selection of the drive is that I had to manually assign a drive letter. I didn’t try the automatic driver Simon as I already have two Windows XP’s on hard drive zero.

Here are the steps to install Windows XP on a second hard disk. Assuming you are installing Windows XP onto the 18 GB hard disk, follow the following steps.

01: Install Easy BCD in Windows 7. Start Easy BCD. Under “boot loader set up” click on write MBR. Under “BCD backup repair” select the radio button for “re-create/repair boot files”.

02: Physically disconnect both the power and data wires for the other two disks that you are installing Windows XP to. Make sure that you still have a power wire going to the CD-ROM/DVD burner.

03: Wipe the 18 GB hard disk with Darik's Boot And Nuke or a similar program.

Darik's Boot And Nuke
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darik%27s_Boot_and_Nuke

Click where it says “DBAN 2.2.6 Beta for CD-R and DVD-R media”.
http://www.dban.org/download

04: In the BIOS set the system to failsafe defaults. Then change the boot order so that it boots CD-ROM first and hard disk second and third.

05: Load a Windows XP CD install disk preferably with service pack three slipstreamed into it into the CD-ROM/DVD burner and reboot. Note that you will need at least service pack one slipstreamed into the disk to deal with hard disks bigger than 128 MB. Note that you can still technically install Windows XP on a hard drives bigger 128 GB by making sure that the partition or partitions that you are installing Windows XP to, combined, do not exceed 128 GB. In other words leave the rest of the hard drive empty of partitions.

06: At the partitioning screen make a 100 MB partition. Then make a partition taking up the rest of the hard disk. When it asks you where he wants all the operating system to, select the large partition. When it asks what type of formatting you want to do to select NTFS full format. Do not, repeat do not, use a third-party program to do the partitioning ahead of time. Also note that you cannot format the 100 megabyte small partition. Don’t worry about it. After Windows XP copies its files to the hard desk it will reboot the computer. If the installation is going successfully it will bypass the CD that should still be in the CD/DVD burner and continue the installation process. Continue the installation and complete it. Do a reboot to make sure that you can boot into Windows XP. You’ll know when you are at this completed stage when the OS asks you to take a tour of Windows XP. It will also complain about your security settings.

07: Power the system off. Reconnect the hard disk data cables and power cables. Power on the system and enter the BIOS. Don’t make any changes in the BIOS. Insert a Ubuntu install disk in the CD-ROM/DVD burner and boot into Ubuntu live mode. Run the GParted partition editor. From the pull down arrow at the far upper right select the third disk. The first partition should have its boot flag set to active. Left click on that partition. Right-click. Select manage flags. In the box to the left of where it says boot, left click once so that the checkmark is removed. Remove the disk and reboot. You should now boot back into Windows 7.

08: Start It the Windows Explorer a.k.a. file manager. Find the disk letter of the second partition on the disk where you installed Windows XP. From the list of disk letters two should not have names. These are the two on the hard disk which you have installed Windows XP to. One is the 100 MB partition and the other is the larger one. The larger one is the one you want. Note it’s drive letter.

Start Easy BCD. Click on add new entry. Under type select “Windows NT/2K/XP/2K3”. To the left of the checkbox were says automatically detect correct disk deselect the check mark. Above that were says disk letter select the drive letter you determined in the prior step.

See the bottom of the following for a pictorial on how to add the Windows XP entry to Easy BCD.
http://neosmart.net/wiki/display/EBCD/Windows+XP

This is a special note. Easy BCD by default only displays six operating system choices. If you have more OS’s press the down key to get to them.

Note if for any reason you can’t boot back into Windows 7, use a Windows 7 recovery CD to repair the boot.
 
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Ah, thanks. I downloaded one of the XP discs, so I'm pretty sure it has SP2. So I'll use it or download the SATA drivers. That could be one of my problems! lol
And I didn't know that about the boot loader, so I'll keep that in mind...
 
Yes Windows XP with service pack two slipstreamed into it should be fine. No need to download any SATA drivers.

Terry,

I believe it is service pack one that exceeded the 128 (137GB (48-bit LBA support)” gigabyte barrier. It also is the service pack that adds support for SATA drives. However, a while back I installed Windows XP with no service packs on a 500 GB SATA drive. I did it by making sure that the combined partitions did not take up more than 128 GB. I also tested the installation of Windows XP with no service packs on a drive exceeding 128 GB and the result was that the installation simply destroyed the MBR of the single drive I was testing it on. It was easy to fix though with a DOS 6.22 floppy boot disk using the fdisk /mbr command.

Windows XP service pack one
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_xp#Service_Pack_1


DOS Boot Disks:
http://www.allbootdisks.com/download/iso.html
 
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Thank You

I don't know what happened to my reply from yesterday?? Anyway, I said thanks so much for the info! Not sure what I'm going to do now, but I'll figure something out. Later...
 
Dear Pillars,
I didn't see your post re: reversing the hard drives until tonight. I don't know why, but whatever. One hd is SATA and the other ide, so I can't reverse them. However, I'm going to read over your post and proceed in the next couple days. I'll let you know how it goes!
Thanks again, it seems like I should be able to get this accomplished with your thorough run through.
 
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