Re: Please help! Multi-boot option not working anymore



"q5485" <guest@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message news:eec233b00b8b6ca11c8a764c6ca4bbbd@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Hi Shawn & Others
Many thanks for offering to help me.
First, when I boot up, I do see Vista's System Recovery Options (after
selecting keyboard and language). But none of the other options in the
menu seem to work.
For instance, the option to do startup repairs (the 1st one in that
list) does not repair the startup. I am afraid to do complete recovery
(one of the other options) as I will lose all of my data.
I did try the 3 switches as mentioned by CH (bootrec /fix mbr, bootrec
/fixboot and bootrec /rebuildbcd). The 1st 2 worked but it could not
find any Vista installations in the 3rd switch.
For all 3 switches, it did say operation completed successfully but for
the 3rd switch it said: Total Identified Windows Installations: 0


Even in the recovery options window, it could not locate any windows
installations on any drive, nor could it find any backup or restore
files. In that window where it is searching for windows installations, I
see 2 tabs ("Load Drivers" and "Next") but there is no vista
installation listed. When I click on "load drivers", I get into
X:\windows\system32 sub-directory but I have no idea which drivers to
select from my hard drive. Apparently, I need to load drivers for my
hard drives (Hitachi & Western Digital).
I have a feeling that my MBR is corrupted. I attempted to "repair" xp
before, and I am not able to boot to the drive containing xp. Once I can
see the xp desktop, I can then install vistaboot pro and attempt to
repair mbr so that I can get vista up & running.
I am sure there is an easier way. Do I have to change the primary
partition to "bootable" or ??? I also have the ultimate boot loader disc
which I have using to get somethings to work but have not been
successful.

To answer the question, what do I see when I boot up? I get the option
of booting from my cd, which I don't. Then I get the option to select my
language and keyboard. After that I see the System Recovery Options (I
presume, from my vista). Somehow, it cannot find my vista installation.

I am trying to avoid re-installation of xp pro since I want to retain
my documents folder and my outlook express settings (on my xp pro)
drive. I cannot reinstall vista since I don't have any installation
dvds.

Thanks for your suggestion and I am sure we will find a way.
Kash


--
q5485

Hi q--

None of the startup repair options I gave you are going to "lose" anything. They're not designed to lose anything. If you were to use a system restore option somewhere in the hierarchy of my directions, the most that would happen is that you'd lose desktop shortcuts or folders you created on the desktop or elsewhere or hotfixes and updates deployed only since that particular restore point. SR doesn't track data, and again none of the options in the panoply of Startup Repair tools or at the F8 Windows Advanced Options Menu loses anything other than the qualification I gave you that's insignficant with System Restore.

I'm not sure what you mean by complete recovery in terms of what I gave you, but if the word recovery is not part of what I gave you, and it were an OEM recovery disc or partition, then you'd go back to factory settings and would have a virgin Vista without any of your stuff. I think you are talking about the option to use a full backup if and only if you'd created one via Vista's Complete Backup option in the first place. My problem with it and Acronis and other backups is that sometimes people can't recover from the compressed folders they make, and what they made is hard to ID whereas backups to media are what you see what you get, easily retrieved and ID'd.

The Startup Repair disc you've made or the Vista disc should be bootable without going to bios setup but it takes a second and you can make sure that nothing is in the way of booting from the CD if you made a startup repair disc or DVD if you're using a Vista or there is an option to download a Win 7 DVD now with RC1 available, but I don't know why you'd need to do that since it's at lest 2.5 GB to 3+ for Win 7 64 and the startup repair option from my link is in MB and much smaller.

I also pass on these options from SIW2 that could help.

You could try getting hold of bootsect.exe ( it's not on the Neosmart
repair cd).

It is in the bin folder of the free Easybcd. 'Download EasyBCD 1.7.2 -
NeoSmart Technologies' (http://neosmart.net/dl.php?id=1)

Copy bootsect.exe to a cd.

Boot the repair cd to command prompt, find the drive letter for your
dvd drive by typing:

X:sources>Diskpart {enter}

Diskpart> lis vol {enter}

make a note of the dvd drive letter.

Diskpart> exi {enter}

Remove the repair cd and put in the cd containing bootsect.exe

Follow instructions at Step 3 here:

'Recovering the Vista Bootloader from the DVD - NeoSmart Technologies
Wiki'
(http://neosmart.net/wiki/display/EBCD/Recovering+the+Vista+Bootloader+from+the+DVD)

and

You might try running checkdisk from the command prompt :

http://www.vistax64.com/tutorials/67612-check-disk-chkdsk.html

Otherwise, you could try booting from the 7 dvd and installing it to
the partition you created - it should add Vista as a boot option.

'Clean Install Windows 7 - Windows 7 Forums'
(http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/1649-clean-install-windows-7-a.html)

and additionally

You can d/l this free app. from the nice people at Paragon - it burns
itself to cd.

'FREE Rescue Kit 9.0 Express - Don't wait for disaster, get instant
data recovery software!'
(http://www.paragon-software.com/home/rk-express/)

Boot the cd - use the File Transfer Wizard to save anything you need
before reinstalling.

Best,

CH



.

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