XP boot question

monomaniac

I have 2 HD's and currently only run one OS - XP SP2. Here's my problem

HD #1 contains all the neccessary boot files (boot.ini etc) on a small 200MB partition. there are 2 other partitons on this disk - a 8Gb Linux partiton (which I'm no longer using) and around 70Gb NTFS.

HD #2 has the windows installation etc (no partitions)

At the moment my windows setup relies on both HDs being present and I'd like it to only need one HD to boot.

I don't want to re-install XP. I have Partiton Magic 8 though am not totally confident in using it for major partiton shifts - have been burned before.

:eek:

Any advice on whats the easiest way around this?

Thanks mm

martinoc

You face many problems. The boot files need to be where they are because it's the drive that windows boots from. Moving the installation is going to be difficult because you'll need to change paths almost everywhere. (different drive letters).

Do you use LILO or GRUB as a bootloader since you have linux installed?
If you do, there may be some light at the end of the tunnel.

using fdisk, activate the boot flag on the partition of the second hard disk.
next, copy all boot files from the original partition, including hidden files


attrib - look for hidden and system files

At this point, you may need to write the mbr to the second HD - how you go about it depends on wheather you have FAT or NTFS on that disk.

next boot into linux and add a windows xp entry with /dev/hdb1 as the new boot
partition for either GRUB or LILO.

Do not overwrite original configuration or original boot files in case this process does not work. Once you're sure its working, you can do what you like.

monomaniac

Originally posted by martinoc

Do you use LILO or GRUB as a bootloader since you have linux installed?
If you do, there may be some light at the end of the tunnel.

Fraid not - I don't even have the root password anymore so logging into Linux is out

You face many problems. The boot files need to be where they are because it's the drive that windows boots from. Moving the installation is going to be difficult because you'll need to change paths almost everywhere. (different drive letters).

Thought that would be the case - doh!

Someone suggested to me to somehow use the Windows Recovery Console to create new boot files on the 2nd HD if the original ones aren't detected. Any ideas on this?

martinoc

yeah, the recovery console has two commands
fixboot and fixmbr (or is that bootfix and mbrfix - try one anyhow)

they will actualy write the boot sector and mbr - but probably back to the first hd

see if there is a way to change it to the second hd

but you still have the problem of actually getting the second hd to boot.

if you can't set BIOS to boot from the second hd, you'll need some kind of bootloader on the first hd

monomaniac

At work at the moment so can't try any of this till I get home -

If I unplug HD #1 and set the HD #2 jumper as the master drive etc and run recovery console, should HD #2 then be bootable?

And to complicate it even further my XP Corp CD isn't bootable and I don't have a floppy drive

However, I do have XP Prof CDs which are bootable (though it is Corp Edition installed on my system) - can I run the recovery console from these?

Alternatively I have a Win98 Cd that will let me boot into DOS - can i run the Corp CD recovery console after doing that?

martinoc

Switching hds should do the trick.

Recovery console can only be started by booting from winxp cdrom - it does not matter which version cds you use.

FYI, the recovery console can also be started by holding F8 during a normal boot but that is out of the question since your hd won't boot in the first place.

monomaniac

Cheers for all the advice... not confident enough to do this yet though.

For anyone following the problem, this is the MS KBA for the XP recovery console
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=KB;en-us;314058&

If I take off HD #1 (see above) and boot into the recovery console (with HD #2) which commands should I use?
Is FIXBOOT enough or do I need to run FIXMBR also? The partiton tables are currently stored on HD #1.

Any advice would be appreciated.

Cheers mm

martinoc

you need to run both
fixmbr first and the fixboot

fixmbr will write the master boot record

fixboot will write the boot sector on the active partition (even if you only have the one partition occupying the entire disk)

re trying it, you have nothing to lose, the original bootloader will be nice and safe on hd1, so go right ahead.

monomaniac

Originally posted by martinoc
you have nothing to lose, the original bootloader will be nice and safe on hd1, so go right ahead.

That's what i wanted to hear
Cheers for the advice!!!

vibe666

if you're really stuck you can use ranish partition manager http://www.ranish.com/ which has a boot manager in it to do all the work. set it to boot the xp installation on that particular hd and you should be set.

just had a similar sort of problem on one of my pc's. wasn't able to boot at all. all i was getting was a screen full of 99's e.g. 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 to about the halfway mark on screen, just after post.

tried getting rid of linux partitions and using the recovery console for the old fixboot and fixmbr but had no luck. stumbled on this feature of ranish completely by accident and it worked a treat.

get it from the above URL (fits on a boot floppy easily) or download the UBCD from www.ultimatebootcd.com which has it on and burn the image to a cdr (very handy).

just set your xp disk/partition to active and at the bottom of the screen set it to use it's boot manager to boot that OS as default. it doesn't properly support ntfs, so you'll have minimum options if you are using ntfs, but it should still work fine (as it did on mine).

monomaniac

Recovery console method didn't work

After I logged into the console I could not run a dir command and when I tried fixboot it returned the message
"Cannot access this partiton"

Cheers for the ranish tip vibe666 - will check it out tonight. Though I'm edging towards the OS re-installation method now.

vibe666

at least give ranish a go, it'll only take 5 minutes. and i just remembered that as well as the boot cd, ranish is on the ubd (ultimate boot disk) which is a floppy boot disk with lots of tools on it.

it'll be a lot quicker to download and you'll have the same stuff (albeit with a few bits missing) as with the boot cd.

give it a go anyway, and if it doesn't work then you're only 5 minutes late in reinstalling xp, but if it does you'll have saved yourself a few hours.

monomaniac

Will try the UBCD - should I unplug the first HD (contains the current partition table and boot files etc) and just use the 2nd HD which has 3 partitions:
2 Linux and a 60Gb NTFS partiton (with the windows installation)?

Or should I keep both disks on and run the boot CD?

Also, does the HD that I want the boot sector to be on have to be the primary drive?

(Boot management always spins my head )

ColmOT [MSFT]

Just copy ntldr, ntdetect.com and boot.ini from your current boot partition to the boot partition where your Windows XP SP2 lives.

Then set this drive as IDE0 Master and it should boot that way.

Don't forget to edit your boot.ini if necessary.

monomaniac

Originally posted by ColmOT [MSFT]
Just copy ntldr, ntdetect.com and boot.ini from your current boot partition to the boot partition where your Windows XP SP2 lives.

Do I not need to have a partition table on this drive?

Is it this simple - didn't think to try that?

vibe666

when in doubt, give it a go, and see what happens.

then try the ranish thing if it doesn't.

the ranish boot manager will boot whatever drive you tell it to though, so one way or the other you should be OK.