Windows 7 64 bit XP 64 bit

G

gorky

Member
I have an AMD X2 processor, with Win 7 Prof 64 bit newly installed on a SATA drive. My old IDE drive was formatted and empty, waiting for XP Pro 64 bit.

I followed your instructions exactly, but I was required to install the 64 bit version of the .NET framework, rather than the x86 version to which you link in your instructions. Booted into the new XP OK.

At first EasyBCD could not find the BCD, so I navigated to c:\boot on the W7 disk, and located it.

Followed the instructions exactly, but when finished got “failed to detect a valid installation of windows nt-2003 ...” . At this stage I abandoned ship, re-formatted the IDE drive so it's empty again, and rebuilt the MBR in Win 7 using Repair on the Setup disk. So I am exactly where I was 3 hours ago !!

I feel this should have been the simplest of your setup scenarios - so where did it go wrong?
 
Gorky,

Welcome to the board!

I am not an expert on utilizing more than one hard drive so I’m sure someone else can comment.

I gather you’re trying to dual boot Windows 7 on your first hard drive and Windows XP on the second hard drive is that correct?

In which Windows did you install Easy ECD?

“At first EasyBCD could not find the BCD, so I navigated to c:\boot on the W7 disk, and located it.”

Don’t know what you mean by BCD or anything else in the sentence. Could you please clarify.

Are you also saying that the first hard drive is SATA while the second hard drive is IDE?
 
Install XP to the IDE drive with the W7 SATA disk disconnected. (Don't use a non-standard name for the Windows folder)
Reconnect W7 as the 1st HDD in the BIOS boot sequence
Boot W7
Run EasyBCD 2
Add an XP entry to the BCD, letting EasyBCD auto-configure.


Addendum:


Then, in XP, run this registry hack to protect your W7 restore points
 
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BCD etc

Thanks Pillars

The first drive (Win 7) is the SATA, as set in BIOS. Second drive is IDE disk.
EasyBCD is installed on the Win 7 drive already. When you open it there, it is able to find the boot details - it looks for an entry BCD in c:\boot.

However, as per instructions I installed EasyBCD in the newly installed XP on the other drive. Obviously it can't find c:\boot on that drive because XP doesn't have one, so you have to show it where to find it on the Win 7 disk - no problem - and it reads it OK.

I am curious to discover why it can't find the (presumably) normal "windows nt-2003" etc on both systems. I am left wondering if something to do with having used the 64 bit version of the .NET service pack.

Addendum:

That makes sense to me! Keeping XP under control seems to be the key?

I will give it a try now ...

What's the Window NT message caused by?

Addendum:

I put my reply to your post onto Pillars' post by mistake.

Here it is again

That makes sense to me! Keeping XP under control seems to be the key?

I will give it a try now ...

What's the Window NT message caused by?
 
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There are two problems I've seen with EasyBCD not being able to detect an XP installation.
The first is obvious - if you install using a non-standard folder name (not "Windows" or "WinNT"), the software can't second-guess your choice of name.
The second occurs ( I think) when there is a confusion over the boot drive. Easy assumes the BCD is on the "active" partition on the BIOS first boot HDD. If you've got the BIOS set wrong and the boot has skipped a drive before finding a bootable active partition, my impression is that the detection code might miss the first drive (CG confirm or refute ??)
If you follow my previous post, disconnecting W7 will protect the existing boot from regression by XP, and a simple reconnect will restore the status quo ante (after you've reset the BIOS boot sequence. It will automatically change if you boot with the previous boot disk disconnected).
Running Easy (always the latest Beta build) from W7 with a clean standard XP install on a second HDD will find the XP and dual boot it automatically.
 
Terry, that won't result in EasyBCD being unable to detect XP. It ***may*** result in EasyBCD writing boot.ini to the right hard disk, but I doubt even that.

The only things that would cause EasyBCD to give the "no XP detected" message in the latest released build are:

* FAT32 boot drive
* Windows XP folder not WINNT or WINDOWS
* Windows XP partition not mounted

In the latest beta build, the first issue is dropped.
 
I actually don't think that's something I tested..

Addendum:

Just tested it on Windows XP SP3 and it worked OK.
 
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