Vista / XP Dual Boot Not Working

Dave

Member
Hello people, I am fairly new into the world of dual booting, as I have always thought it is scary :smile: Still, I now feel the urge to run Vista and XP on the same machine, and hence I am taking my first steps into the unsure world of rewriting the MBR....:huh:

A quick overview of my setup:

I have always had one IDE disk in this pc, with 2 partitions. Currently I have windows Vista installed on the C:\ partition of that, and D:\ is still my data drive.
Now, I wanted to add good old XP (since some programs dont run well on Vista) and have added a small IDE disk to provide a space for that. Installed XP on it, and the following occurs:

XP only boots, and drives are arranged like: c: Vista, d: XP, e:grinning:ata

Repaired Vista booting with the Vista DVD:
Vista only boots, and drives arranged like: c: Vista, d: Data e&f:CD drives g:XP

Used EasyBCD 1.5, added an XP record for G:\, now this will give the following message:

"Windows failed to start" etc etc...
File: \ntldr
Status: 0xc000000f
Info: The selected entry could not be loaded because the application is missing or corrupt.

Tried adding an XP record for D:\, same story!

I've read your topic here: http://neosmart.net/forums/index.php?gettopic=161 to see if I could make it work with the tips given there, but to no avail. I've tried using the bcdedit tool, and used 'fixboot' & 'fixmbr' on the XP partition, still I get the same error. His case sounds very much like mine though, with one difference: he's got his XP install on C:, as where I have it on D: or G:, depending from which OS you judge.

Could anyone shine a light on this case, as mentioned earlier, I am fairly new in this world, and only take tiny wobbly steps :unamused:
 
Hey Dave, welcome to NeoSmart Technologies!

Don't worry, dual-booting isn't *that* scary, and with EasyBCD it's downright simple :smile:

Try adding XP as drive C:

It all depends on where XP installs NTLDR, it's usually the same drive, but with certain dual-boots that's not the case.
With EasyBCD 1.6 it'll automagically figure all that stuff out, so no worries then. But for now, try to use XP as drive C: in EasyBCD and see what happens.

Good luck!
 
Ooooh, that tip was spot on :smile:

Mine was definately one of them 'certain' dual-boots... works a charm, thanks!

I'll keep checking the site for new releases of this program, works even for nitwits like me! :smile:
 
You're not a nitwit! Just dual-boot challenged like everyone else... it's abnormal to be otherwise :grinning:

I'm going to be making a (very) low-traffic mailing list for release notifications for NeoSmart Technologies software.... so much need for it.

Anyways, glad EasyBCD worked for you :smile:

BTW, when XP overwrites your MBR, you don't have to boot into the Vista DVD to fix it, just install and run EasyBCD, it'll do it for you!!! :smile:
 
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