Dual Boot mess

[sack_patrol]

I tried installing Windows XP on my old HDD as a second OS but for some reason I messed up.

 

The problem is that now I can't even start my Windows 7. What I get is, right after the first black screen when I boot up, I get a "Disck read error occurred Press Ctrl+Alt+Del to restart". If I do what it says it doesn't fix the thing. I removed the old hdd and left just the new one with the install of Windows 7 on it and it still gives me the error.

 

What I did to install windows xp was the following step by step:

 

1: Restarted and put in my Windows 7 CD so that I format my old HDD which had also a WIn7 installation. I didn't touch the new hdd at all. All I did was format the old HDD and made 2 new patrtitions - 1 for windows, 1 for my games, music etc.

 

2: IMPORTANT!! After the format I loged into Windows 7 to make sure I formated the right stuff. And I did, My installation on the new HDD was allright with everything working.

 

3: I then restarted and put the XP CD in the drive and loaded it up. I saw the 2 partitions that were ready for the XP and I chose the small one to install XP on it with NTFS. I also saw the partitions of the new hdd but I didn't touch em at all.

 

4: I began the XP installation the small partition mentioned above and everything went seemingly well. After the installation was done, I restarted the PC and I got the message "Disck read error occurred Press Ctrl+Alt+Del to restart"

 

5: Obviously I panicked and after I tried doing the Ctrl+Alt+Del and it didn't work, I went back into the Win7 CD and deleted the partitions on the old HDD thus deleting anything on it which was the XP installation.

 

6: Restarted and still got the message. Then I unplugged the old HDD from the mobo altogether. Still can't log into my Windows 7.

 

7: Post on Overclockersclub.com through my laptop.

END.

 

What I think happened was that I forgot to do something in the Windows 7 before even beginning the XP install and now my OS is super confused to WTF is happening. So it doesn't know which OS to boot + 1 of the OSs is missing now so it's a total mess. Maybe when installing the XP something got registered on Windows 7 telling it that a new OS will now be a second bootable os...I don't know exactly. I have reason to believe that my Windows 7 installation + everything on it is still working, all I gotta do is "tell" it that there is no other OS anymore and that it can boot as it did before. I don't know how tho. All I can access now is the Command Promt from the Win7 CD.

[Zertz]

Since you destroyed the XP partition, I'm pretty sure you're screwed.

 

The idea is to install XP first and then Vista/7. If you go with Vista/7 first (which I have never done) you have to go through a few hoops to make it work.

Check this out

 

Next time, leave out the panic part and do some research

[sack_patrol]

Damn it to hell.

 

I knew I should have read some guides first... Anyway. Thx for the reply. Tho I don't think that even after I installed XP the way I did, I could have made it work since that's when this mess started. I should have followed the steps that I didn't even read in a guide that showed how to install XP after an installation of 7 was already there.

 

Well nothing left to do but install windows 7 again. At lest half my work is done since I won't have to copy my back up stuff from the laptop using my 2gb flash drive. All I gotta do is reinstall windows in it's proper partition and leave my games, music etc partition alone. I'll still have to do the customization stuff all over again but I guess at this point I'm in no position to be making any calls so I'm grateful for at least my saved data.

 

 

...I normally hate looking on the bright or dark side of things since it's useless, and I'm pretty much 100% realist, and my glass is never half full or half empty. For me the content has simply reached a level which is the middle and that's how it is. Though in a case like this, I could safely say that little mess ups like this one helps me learn from my mistakes and I'll be better next time. So I guess this wasn't a total loss. Cuz obviously ballist1x loves his retro games so I gotta get this thing to work. It's pretty late and tomorrow I got a test so I won't do it now, but after school I'll do the dual boot right.

Edited April 28, 2010 by ballist1x

[dr_bowtie]

vista boot pro may fix the win7 install...

 

next time unplug the OS drive and install on a separate drive and just swap boot order at POST...

 

then it doesnt matter....

[sack_patrol]

vista boot pro may fix the win7 install...

 

next time unplug the OS drive and install on a separate drive and just swap boot order at POST...

 

then it doesnt matter....

well that's what I was thinking about...sorta... Like I'll do a clean install of Windolws 7 now, I've backed up my stuff on the old drive. Then after it's done, I'll Cut-Paste the info back into my new HDD with Windows 7. When that's done I'll unplug this drive and only leave the old one and install XP as if I would normally.

 

Though after I'm done with that too and I got 2 hard disks with 2 operating systems, do I need to change any options or do anything else before plugging them both at the same time, or that's all I gotta do, and the boot screen will let me choose which to use?

[El_Capitan]

You do know you get Virtual PC for free by having Windows 7? You can create a Windows XP virtual machine rather than dual boot. It's easy to back-up a VM (no need for Acronis True Image or Norton Ghost).

[sack_patrol]

I managed to fix the dual boot by installing XP, then reinstalling windows 7 in it's proper partition. Now I get the choice screen, although it shows 3 entries. There's WIndows 7, Windows XP and there's "An older version of Windows" or something like that which is basically WinXP. Not that it causes problems but maybe there's a way to remove it and simply have XP and 7 show on the list? Anyone know how to modify this list?