Windows 7/XP Dual Boot with XP hanging

J

jaypavlica

Member
I have recently purchased a new hard drive and I installed Windows 7 while my existing XP drive was disconnected ( I probably should have left it in place). My original problem I had trying to boot to XP involved the missing NTLDR error on startup. I just installed EasyBCD 2.0 Beta and did the automatic XP entry add and my issue now is that when I start my machine and choose XP it will just hang with no hard drive activity. I can get my XP hard drive to boot up if I go into the BIOS and disable the Windows 7 Hard drive. Does anyone have suggestions that I can try without losing data.

Thanks for any advice!

Jay
 
When you added an XP entry, did you change the drive that EasyBCD chose for you?

Please go to Diagnostics | Copy Debug Info then paste the contents of your clipboard here in a reply.
 
I did not try to change the drive selected by EasyBCD. When my Windows 7 OS boots it shows the XP disk as the E:. My entries look like this:

There are a total of 2 entries listed in the bootloader.
Default: Windows 7
Timeout: 30 seconds.
EasyBCD Boot Device: E:\
Entry #1
Name: Windows 7
BCD ID: {current}
Drive: C:\
Bootloader Path: \Windows\system32\winload.exe
Entry #2
Name: Windows XP
BCD ID: {39652ee1-c9ea-11de-88b2-f3fc8342ef30}
Drive: E:\
Bootloader Path: \NTLDR

Thanks for your further assistance!

Jay
 
Hi Jay, welcome to NST.
If you did as you said, and installed W7 with XP disconnected, why is the boot partition E: ?
Is W7 1st in the BIOS boot sequence or XP ?
Did you install/run Easy2 on XP or on W7 ?
 
I am not sure how E:\ became the boot drive. I am guessing that is wrong. In my BIOS the Windows 7 appears to boot first. I installed EasyBCD on Windows 7 and that is where the configuration came from. I can only get XP to run at all if I disable the Windows 7 hard drive in the BIOS.

Jay
 
Using the latest build of EasyBCD 2.0, from the "diagnostics center" use the new facility to move the boot files back onto the W7 drive.
Delete the XP entry, add it again and let it auto-configure.
(Make sure that W7 is before XP in the BIOS boot sequence not just in the HDD list)
 
I will try that later this evening and let you know if I have success.

Thanks again

Jay

Addendum:

I attempted your correction and it didn't appear to work. On my next boot it got hung up before the options for Windows 7 or XP appeared. I used the Windows 7 DVD to recover the startup and now all boot options are gone and it goes straight to Windows 7 start up. I loaded up EasyBCD again and the Windows XP entry is gone. If I try to add XP again do I not select which drive it is (E: which is where it shows up now)?

Thanks
Jay
 
Last edited:
Well I figured out my problem. As pointed out earlier by Terry I didn't have the correct Hard Drive as being first in line for booting! I made that modification and re-added the XP entry and I now have a perfectly working dual-boot system!

Thanks very much for everyone's help!

Jay
 
Hi all!
Have a similar situation but with this config:

W7 in HD1 and XP in HD2
HD1 is device 0 in bios
HD2 is device 1 in bios
Both installations working. Xp working when HD1 is disconnected.
Cannot find the way to dual-boot them.
Have used EasyBCD 2[1][1].0 Beta - Build 76.exe and this is what I get using auto-configure (no other option for XP) :

"There are a total of 2 entries listed in the bootloader.
Default: Windows 7
Timeout: 30 seconds.
EasyBCD Boot Device: C:\
Entry #1
Name: Windows 7
BCD ID: {current}
Drive: C:\
Bootloader Path: \Windows\system32\winload.exe
Entry #2
Name: Microsoft Windows XP
BCD ID: {c5febd49-cb16-11de-9530-83ef675d010b}
Drive: C:\
Bootloader Path: \NTLDR"

NTLDR is not found when trying to boot in XP.

Your assistance is highly appreciated.
Thanks in advance!
Mat
 
Last edited:
Hey Mat, welcome to NST.
Looks like the auto-configure feature of EasyBCD failed for some reason...
You will need to copy over NTDLR, NTDETECT.COM, and BOOT.INI from the XP drive to the W7 drive. You'll find them in the root of the XP drive, and you should copy them over into the root of the W7 drive.
However, you will need to be showing hidden files and folders, and have unhidden protected system files, in the Folder Options of the Control Panel, first before you will be able to see those files.
Once copying the boot files over, you will need to modify your boot.ini, to change the rdisk(0) value in both lines to an rdisk(1) instead.

Then you'll have a dual-boot.

Cheers.

Jake
 
Thanks vmuch Coolname007!
I've missed to say that there is also another HD with XP, which dual-boots with XP mentioned in my last post.
Boot.ini of XP of last post reading as foll:
[boot loader]
timeout=20
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS="XP 1" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="XP 2" /fastdetect

How should it read now?
Will both dual-boots still work?
Need to do something else with EasyBCD?

Thank you in advance!
Mat
 
Files copied as explained and changed rdisk nbrs too,
but XP won´t boot... when choosing it video goes blank and have to reset...
Here´s my modifyed boot.ini
[boot loader]
timeout=20
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS="XP 1" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(2)partition(1)\WINDOWS="XP 2" /fastdetect

suggestions much appreciated!
Thanks!
Mat
 
Last edited:
Did you really use auto-configure in EasyBCD2 ?
That boot.ini is not in the format that EasyBCD produces when you auto-configure .
 
Auto-configure was used the first time approving EasyBCD to modify files.
The result was W7 no booting any more. Had to use recovery booting from W7 DVD.
Second time did not allow EasyBCD to modify NTDLR, etc and copied those files manually as suggested by Coolname007.
 
You added an XP entry to the W7 BCD and W7 stopped booting ?!!
With what symptoms ?
If EasyBCD had even the slightest tendancy to screw the host system by just adding a new entry to the BCD, we'd have been inundated with complaints for years. (We haven't btw).
Can you confirm you did nothing in any other EasyBCD screen.
You also say in your 1st post, HDD 1 comes before HDD2 in the BIOS. Can you confirm that's not just in the list of devices, but in the BIOS boot sequence.
The reason why the XP auto-configure was added to Easy2 is precisely to avoid the manual difficulty you're having configuring boot.ini.
the boot.ini rdisk and partition values come from sources you (the user) can't see with conventional system tools, ie the BIOS disk numbers and the MBR partition table sequence, so the traditional advice (pre Easy2) for finding the right values, was "try all permutations from rdisk(0-n) and partition(1-m) till you find the one that works" (n being number of HDDs-1, m being maximum number of partitions on your HDDs)
Try Easy2 again.
Make sure W7 is 1st boot HDD
Run W7
Run Easy2 from W7
add an XP entry
auto-configure
Don't change what EasyBCD sets up.
 
Last edited:
Thanks Terry!
If it helps and before running from scratch again, here are HDDs Devices in BIOS and logical letter from W7 perspective:
Device 0 W7 "C"
Device 1 XP1 "D" (XP1-XP2 dual-boot)
Device 2 XP2 "E"
Cheers!
Mat
 
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