Hi folks,
I am trying to configure a triple-boot configuration with Windows 7, Windows XP and Mac OS X. WinXP was installed first followed by Win7. Dual-booting between those was originally working fine, but of course I wanted to bring back my OS X partition. I installed EasyBCD, configured the boot menu and I was able to successfully launch both Win7 and WinXP. Mac OS X didn't work, so I tried hitting that little "Write MBR" button. Ever since then, when I boot WinXP, it seems to think the /WINDOWS folder is under the F: drive instead of C:. As such, upon login, WinXP is looking for /WINDOWS/System32/wlnotify.dll on the "F:" drive and cannot find it, so it just hangs there for a few minutes then kicks me back to the login prompt. The same happens when launching in Safe Mode.
I cannot for the life of me figure out why this is. I used the "Automatic" configuration when configuring the boot menu item and did not change the drive letters.
My bcd file is as follows:
As can be seen here, nowhere is there an F: drive mentioned in the config. In Win7, F: actually maps to my optical drive. I have no idea why EasyBCD would re-write the WinXP partition's MBR to point to F:.
My boot.ini on the Win7 partition is:
My WinXP partition comes up as drive D: in Win7 but the disk and partition paths here are correct. On my HDD, first is my WinXP partition, followed by Win7, then Mac OS X.
I've found one other user on this forum who encountered the same problem and he ultimately ended up re-installing WinXP from scratch. In my mind, that is not really a feasible solution to the problem. I'd like to better understand what EasyBCD does when it writes to the MBR to try to fix it. Other searches online, not tied to dual-booting, also suggest re-installing or running XP's fixmbr.
If this can't be resolved within the EasyBCD configuration, I've also thought about zeroing the MBR completely and rebuilding it with MBRWork, although needless to say I am hesitant to do that.
I'm really stuck on this one. Any ideas are greatly appreciated!
I am trying to configure a triple-boot configuration with Windows 7, Windows XP and Mac OS X. WinXP was installed first followed by Win7. Dual-booting between those was originally working fine, but of course I wanted to bring back my OS X partition. I installed EasyBCD, configured the boot menu and I was able to successfully launch both Win7 and WinXP. Mac OS X didn't work, so I tried hitting that little "Write MBR" button. Ever since then, when I boot WinXP, it seems to think the /WINDOWS folder is under the F: drive instead of C:. As such, upon login, WinXP is looking for /WINDOWS/System32/wlnotify.dll on the "F:" drive and cannot find it, so it just hangs there for a few minutes then kicks me back to the login prompt. The same happens when launching in Safe Mode.
I cannot for the life of me figure out why this is. I used the "Automatic" configuration when configuring the boot menu item and did not change the drive letters.
My bcd file is as follows:
Code:
Windows Boot Manager
--------------------
identifier {9dea862c-5cdd-4e70-acc1-f32b344d4795}
device partition=C:
path \bootmgr
description Windows Boot Manager
locale en-US
default {86deb094-a3f0-11e2-aea2-001fbc00b8c1}
displayorder {86deb094-a3f0-11e2-aea2-001fbc00b8c1}
{2654100c-a341-11e2-a505-aaad26ecf913}
{86deb095-a3f0-11e2-aea2-001fbc00b8c1}
timeout 30
displaybootmenu Yes
Windows Boot Loader
-------------------
identifier {86deb094-a3f0-11e2-aea2-001fbc00b8c1}
device partition=C:
path \Windows\system32\winload.exe
description Windows 7
locale en-US
recoverysequence {26541003-a341-11e2-a505-aaad26ecf913}
recoveryenabled Yes
osdevice partition=C:
systemroot \Windows
resumeobject {ad57b771-a3f2-11e2-95f0-806e6f6e6963}
Real-mode Boot Sector
---------------------
identifier {2654100c-a341-11e2-a505-aaad26ecf913}
device partition=C:
path \NST\AutoNeoGrub0.mbr
description MacOSX86
Real-mode Boot Sector
---------------------
identifier {86deb095-a3f0-11e2-aea2-001fbc00b8c1}
device partition=C:
path \NST\ntldr
description WinXP
As can be seen here, nowhere is there an F: drive mentioned in the config. In Win7, F: actually maps to my optical drive. I have no idea why EasyBCD would re-write the WinXP partition's MBR to point to F:.
My boot.ini on the Win7 partition is:
Code:
[boot loader]
timeout=15
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Windows XP on D:\" /fastdetect
My WinXP partition comes up as drive D: in Win7 but the disk and partition paths here are correct. On my HDD, first is my WinXP partition, followed by Win7, then Mac OS X.
I've found one other user on this forum who encountered the same problem and he ultimately ended up re-installing WinXP from scratch. In my mind, that is not really a feasible solution to the problem. I'd like to better understand what EasyBCD does when it writes to the MBR to try to fix it. Other searches online, not tied to dual-booting, also suggest re-installing or running XP's fixmbr.
If this can't be resolved within the EasyBCD configuration, I've also thought about zeroing the MBR completely and rebuilding it with MBRWork, although needless to say I am hesitant to do that.
I'm really stuck on this one. Any ideas are greatly appreciated!