booting problem

hey, i had vista on my laptop but i wanted xp so i shrinked the vista partition c: and installed xp on d: and it worked.. after that i deleted the vista partition and now my laptopt doesnt boot anymore.. it only boots from cd saying i have to install xp but xp is already installed.. and if i take out the xp cd it says os not found on hdd or something. anyone knows what i should do now?

any help is appreciated, thx!

 

Vista was your active partition. Installing XP gave you another primary, but not active partition. Deleting Vista without switching your active to XP beforehand left you without an active partition to boot from. To recover your OS, you will have to set your XP partition to active again. This can be done with an Fdisk. Alternatively, you can reinstall XP on your now-empty Vista partition, switch the active partition to the old XP partition, and from there, delete your new XP partition without worry.

 

thx for your answer overclocker!

what do i do after i installed xp on d:.. i mean how do i switch the active partition to c: where my old xp is?

 

No prob, killkenny.

For switching the active, here's what you do:

Start->Run->diskmgmt.msc

That'll open up Disk Manager.

From there, right click on your desired partition, and click 'Mark Partition as Active'. Reboot to make sure it works, and once it does, you can delete your new XP partition (the one no longer active).

Good luck!

 

Try using your BIOS setup program first. There are usually some boot device options available. Another option is getting the Gparted live linux CD and using that to turn on the boot flag in that partition.

 

thx both for answering!

i have now tried the method overclocker suggested. the problem is that the "mark partition as active" is in grey, i cant click on it. why is that?

 

That's because you're clicking the partition already active - IE, the one you just installed and booted from. I presume you only have two partitions visible - click the other one, and set that one active. Whenever you boot from an OS in Windows, it calls itself the C partition, and relabels the other partitions around it. So set the other one active, and reboot :^)

 

thx again for your answer overclocker!

if i understand you correctly, i did what you said.. actually on the c: partition is my old xp.. the new xp is on an extended partition and there is written "(boot)" and its on d:.. im sure i didnt mistake because my old xp is on a 20gb partition and the new one on the 30gb.. so i right click on my old xp but the "mark partition as active" is greyed. ??

 

No prob, killkenny. Likely, Vista did something to your XP partition. I'm a bit confused by what you said about the new XP being on an extended partition; I thought XP could only boot from primary partitions. But anyway...

Try downloading VistaBootPro. It's a free boot manager for Vista, but it can be installed on XP. When you run it, click on Diagnostics and click "Run Diagnostics". It should show you all the bootable operating systems on your computer. If it shows you both XPs, then that's good, as it'll mean both are still bootable. Then on the "Manage OS Entries" page, you can change the boot drive (select your desired OS, then go down and check the box titled 'change boot drive', and select the partition where the old XP resides). Then Apply Updates, and reboot.

This should get rid of whatever bit of Vista's boot loader is still in your old XP partition, and enable you to boot from it now.

 

hi overlocker!

when i try to run vistabootpro it says vista cannot be found or is hidden sth, after i click ok an error pops up saying bcd registry is missing/corrupt.. what to do now?

 

Hey killkenny,

Go to the "System Bootloader" window/tab, choose the Windows Legacy Bootloader, choose install on All Drives, click Install Bootloader, and reboot.

 

you could try running the repair console from your XP installation disk and use the fixmbr command

http://www.microsoft.com/resources/.../proddocs/en-us/bootcons_fixmbr.mspx?mfr=true

This has worked for me in the past when I (inadvertantly) deleted a linux installation from a dual boot XP/Linux machine which was using Grub as a bootloader which was on the deleted Linux partition! It sounds like you could have a similar issue.

 

thx for answering again!
i tried again to run vistabootpro.. after clicking lots of times ok of that error window that program poped out. i installed bootloader on all dives and reboot but nothing changed? what is actually supposed to change?
i also tried diagnostic run but it says i have to run it as adminstrator but it didnt work. maybe i should also mention that after clicking any tab that error pops out and after clicking lots of times it disappears..
under manage os entries nothing is listed.

sasanac: thx for the link but i sadly dont understand what i should do..

man, this is really troublesome but i m am thankful for further help!

 

vistas boot loader took over xp, the xp install is there. you just need to repair the boot.ini file to point to the install and you should be set.

I had a similar problem a few weeks ago that I fixed.

You can do it with your xp disk, just go into repair mode and rebuild the boot.ini file.

here are the best instructions I can find:

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=330184



if you cant fix it that way because the xp boot.ini is not on the primary partition, and you cant make it the primary. You have to do something similar for the vista boot loader, its best to use 3rd party software for that one as I dont know any other way.

as a last resort. a format/install will get you up and going for sure.

 

Apart from trying Vicious's suggestion, try this:

Boot into your working XP partition, open my computer, go to tools, folder options, view, and uncheck the box that says 'hide protected operating system files'. Say yes when it asks for confirmation, click apply, then okay.

Then open your root drives for both partitions - IE, open C:\ in one window, and D:\ in another. Then copy every single *file* (not folder, file) from your working partition into the non-working partition. Do not copy hiberfil.sys, or the pagefile, but copy all the other stuff. Say yes to everything it asks you to overwrite.

Then in the non-working partition - the one where you just copied all the files to - open the file titled "boot.ini" with Notepad. It might give you some warning about modifying a system file or something, but don't worry. It should look something like this:

[boot loader]
timeout=3
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\windows
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\windows="XP (default)" /NOEXECUTE=OPTIN /FASTDETECT

Change 1 to 2 in both places. Or if it originally said 2, change the 2s to 1s. Reboot. After rebooting, go back to diskmgmt.msc, and see if you can now set your old partition as active, or if it's still greyed out. If it's still grey, copy this line:

multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\windows="XP (default)" /NOEXECUTE=OPTIN /FASTDETECT

into the boot.ini file on your new XP partition - IE, the working one. Add it just beneath the line that's already there. Make sure the number in parentheses (2) is different from the number in the line that already existed in the boot file - ie, you should now have two lines, one with a (1), and the other with a (2). Then change this line:

default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\windows

to the number in the second line - IE, if your two lines are (1) and (2), and your original line was (1), change the default line to (2). This should enable you to choose from booting either partition when you reboot. Save the file, and reboot.

If it works, boot into your old partition, set it to active, and you'll be done.

 

just looking at the link I had listed.. the fixboot command may do the job and is much simpler to use.

boot your machine using the win xp disk then find the repair console menu option, this will take you to a command prompt. When you get to the command prompt type

fixboot X: (change X for the drive letter where you installed windows XP.)

As I understand it this will add a boot sector to that partition. Once you've done that reboot the machine and hopefully you'll end up booting into Win XP.

The link to the fixboot page is:
http://www.microsoft.com/resources/documentation/windows/xp/all/proddocs/en-us/bootcons_fixmbr.mspx?mfr=true

I hope this helps..

PS: http://www.microsoft.com/resources/.../proddocs/en-us/bootcons_fixmbr.mspx?mfr=true <-- how to get to the repair console

If fixboot doesn't work then try fixmbr as seen in my earlier link as I do know that worked for me, I was just trying to find a simpler way for you!

 

hey ppl, i thought about trying one method after another since i read through all method not knowing which to try.. so i started with the one from vicious and it worked! yay finally

thx alot to everyone who posted here^^

and just to make sure: now its ok to delete the other xp partition (funny that this partition became c: now)? can i just format that partition or do i have to boot from cd and then delete it?

thx in advance!

 

You should be able to delete it, as long as you have made absolutely sure that your old partition is now the active one.

 

I figured mine would work its pretty simple too.

Dont get confused with the partiton names!

Here is a simple way to know whats going on.

Your primary partion is always the C: to the computer (bios) and then every logical partition after that gets the next letter D, E ect.. (assuming you have only one drive and not two)

HOWEVER in windows itself it always addresses the partition its on as the C: inside windows because thats the drive the OS is on and the main drive it runs from.

To explane better...

If you had 3 partitions, each one with windows xp installed.

C, D, and E drive inbios.

and you booted into each OS.

the windows on C: would say C: in windows.

The windows on D: would say C: in wondows for the drives its on and relable the windows on the C: as the D: because it places the partion its on itself as the main one. aka: C:

So dont go into windows thinking that C: is the right one then go into bios and format the wrong partiton or something.

I figured this out at the same time I had to fix the boot.ini file like I showed you how to do. I had Windows XP on C: and Vista on the V:

however when I boot into Vista it says C: instead of V: and I was rather confused.

 

That's why I always label my partitions when planning on doing any form of double booting. Even though the letters change, the names will stay unless the partitions are formatted.

 

ahh not a bad idea, im not even sure how to do that one i'll look into it.

im setting up tripple boot on the c90 so its bound to be confusing.

vista puts windows xp as "former windows version" and vista is just called "microsoft windows" on the boot screen. I wonder what it will say with 2 copies of vista...

I'll have to find that software I used and rename then ^^

on my desktop while I was fixing my boot file I did that so that it says correctly "Windows XP" and "Windows Vista" when I boot on my desktop.

also something that may be helpfull.

When repairing my boot file and listing my windows installs XP shows as "windows" while vista was "WINDOWS" in all caps that was the only way I knew wich install was wich. I had to guess first time around, luckily I guessed right.

 

hey its me again xD

i just formated the partitin with the xp i didnt want to keep and even deleted it but the free space is still not 100%.. i booted from the xp cd to delete it from there but there was only one partition viewable, is it normal that extended partition are not viewable?
my actual question is: when i start my lap i still can choose between my 2 xps.. how do i change that? i thought its because there is still something on the ex-xp partition because its not 100% free space..

any help is appreciated, thx =)