Reinstalled Vista Now Win 7 Wont Boot

Ex_Brit

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My main Vista on Disk 0, C: somehow got corrupted and started giving me constant "Windows Explorer is not responding & has to close..." - type messages so after trying to fix I gave up and formatted/reinstalled Vista Ultimate x64 on C:. I still have access to Vista test rig on D:.
On Disk 1 L: and M: I have Windows 7 main and a Windows 7 test rig but although I have entered them in EasyBCD (installed on C:smile: and they are correctly labelled as per Disk Management, when I try to boot to either of them using iReboot I get a regular black & white error screen stating quite a bit about unable to verify digital signatures for this file click Enter and this simply takes me back to the boot choice menu. It also says something about windows\system32\winload.exe & there was also an error number but I am just too tired to write it all down, sorry.
I figured that youi guys would know what this is.
I've tried deleting entries and re-entering them inEasyBCD to no avail. I just can't get Vista to see Windows 7 for boot purposes, or rather it sees them but wont boot to them.

I can at least still pick up mail on my notebook, haven't had a chance to set it up yet on my PC.
 
Posting from Notebook so if there are errors forgive - I can hardly see the small print.

Same error - code... by the way is 0XC0000428, Windows can't verify the digital signature.

By the way, I took the optional TweakVi doiwnload as I have a license anyway....it's disappeared somewhere.
 
That's a known Vista problem Peter, thinking W7 is bogus.
The workaround used to be to boot from W7 and add Vista to its BCD. (W7 doesn't think Vista's wrong)
"Recreate boot files" from the latest Beta should fix Vista
 
Finally got things so that I can post from the actual PC....here's a pic of EasyBCD.
 

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No, but it's doing the same thing again. It can't be the HDD as D: Vista works fine.
I'm going to format and reinstall again. Your earlier post saying to boot into W7 would be fine if I could do that but I can't. I'm not abvout to start swapping out my hard drives.

I'm wondering if McAfee 2010 is the problem as it has a new access protection which I swear is meddling in my registry.

I'll try not installing it the next time.
 
Have you done "recreate"
I don't mean just delete and add entries
The BCD install/repair button
Recreate boot files option

Addendum:

Reinstalling won't help. It's not something that's gone wrong, it's a bug in Vista.
You don't need to reconfigure your PC, just change the BIOS to boot from W7
 
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Yes that's what I did. Also TweakVista screwed up - fed up with this. Deleted the partition entirely and re-created it and am now reinstalling Vista.

So in a while we'll be able to continue with this LOL.

If I had hair it would be lying in tufts on the floor.


Addendum:


I'll also do a disk check to see what it says about the health of the physical disk.

Addendum:

Have you done "recreate"
I don't mean just delete and add entries
The BCD install/repair button
Recreate boot files option


Addendum:


Reinstalling won't help. It's not something that's gone wrong, it's a bug in Vista.
You don't need to reconfigure your PC, just change the BIOS to boot from W7

Thanks Terry. I'm just installing some essential updates first then I'll try the EasyBCD first, if that fails then I will adjust the BIOS to boot Disk 1 first and try adjusting the boot menu there.
 
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I need to make sure that recreate replaces already existing files.... it may be only adding ones that are missing; I cannot recall!!
 
OK, booting to Disk 1 is out of the question and EasyBCD 2 fails to create the Win 7 boot files correctly.

After changing the boot order in the BIOS I got Boot sector (or manager, can't recall) missing press Ctrl-Alt-Delete to continue or words to that effect.

Is there a Plan C ?

Added later on: I installed both Win 7's from within C: Vista - I do that to preserve drive letters.

It's so annoying to be able to see the systems in Win Exp and not to be able to boot to them.
 
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Yeah, that would be important :smile:


Addendum:


OK, booting to Disk 1 is out of the question and EasyBCD 2 fails to create the Win 7 boot files correctly.

After changing the boot order in the BIOS I got Boot sector (or manager, can't recall) missing press Ctrl-Alt-Delete to continue or words to that effect.

Is there a Plan C ?

Yeah, boot from W7 DVD > Repair computer > Command Prompt. Say bootmgr is on C:

ren c:\bootmgr bootmgr.old
ren c:\boot\bcd bcd.old
exit

Now try startup repair 2-3 times to rcreate the boot files.
 
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Will that not screw up Vista again?


Addendum:


Justin those CMD's - it says it can't find the file specified in both cases.
Startup repair can't find any systems either until I choose L: and then it effected a repair and now I can boot, thanks so much!!

A repair of the first Win 7 startup (i.e. L: and now all OS's are showing up.

Thanks everyone!!
 
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You're most welcome, Peter.

I just took a look at the source for the Repair function - I've improved it throughout and it should be ready in build 91. Thanks for the opportunity to bring this to light!
 
I was getting confused because the boot files are on C: but my first Win 7 OS is L: on the second HDD and of course a Startup Repair with a Win 7 DVD needs a Win 7 OS....my brain had stopped working at that stage. All the more confusing because when then Command Prompt came up for those other transactions that failed, it showed drive X:----- (Something - I can't remember) on the top left, and no matter what CD transactions I did I couldn't get CMD to point anywhere else. I'm not too au fait with CMD transactions, must read up about them I guess.

Thanks everyone for your help. Now I am slowly reinstalling a ton of software. I estimate a week before I'm back to normal in C:.
 
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