Vista - Please help! Multi-boot option not working anymore

Hi
I had successfully installed win xp pro on my pre-installed vista home computer. When I used to boot up, I had the option of selecting one of those 2 OS. I begun having problems with xp pro so I "repaired" it using my xp pro cd. Now, I can't boot into either OS. Please help. I have tinkered with the MBR, FIXMBR, FIXBOOt commands but can't get anything to work. All I get when I boot up is the selection of Keyboards, language and then I get a menu of options such as Repair startup, Memory diagnostics, Recovery (to factory settings) etc., I don't have vista dvd since it came pre-installed on my computer. I do have xp but am afraid of re-installing xp pro since I have documents on borh drives (each drive contains its own operating system). For example, my c drive contains vista, (d is recovery on the same hard drive) and xp pro is on a separate physical drive.
I can see that both drives have windows on them but I am unable to boot. I have managed to get vistaboot pro but can't seem to run it. I can't get xp to run nor can I get vista to run.
Any suggestions? I am sure I am not giving you full information, but if you want, I can answer any of your questions pertaining to my setup.
Thanks in advance.
Kash

Hello Kash,

You can use OPTION ONE in the tutorial below to create a Vista Recovery Disc that you can use to boot into the "System Recovery Options" screen to run a "Startup Repair" on Vista to repair it's boot file.

Create a Recovery Disc


Afterwards, start at step 7 in METHOD TWO of the tutorial below to repair the XP partition.

Dual Boot Installation with Windows Vista and XP

Hope this helps,
Shawn

On Tue, 12 May 2009 17:08:38 -0500, q5485 <guest@xxxxxx-email.com>
wrote:
When you boot from the hard drive, how far into the boot process do
you get? Can you describe what you see on the monitor?
You see this menu of options when booting from the hard drive, or from
some DVD?
If you want a standard installation DVD that allows you to repair
Vista startup, download the Windows 7 RC ISO file and burn it to a DVD
blank.
Since XP is on a separate drive, try booting the computer from that
disk drive by pressing a function key (typically F11 or F12) during
Post that allows you to override the default boot drive, and selecting
the XP drive.

"q5485" <guest@xxxxxx-email.com> wrote in message
news:1bbe909b44104306196d301823987f03@xxxxxx-gateway.com...You can get the Startup Repair Features either by downloading this .iso and
burning them it here

Download Vista Repair Disk
http://neosmart.net/blog/2008/window...disc-download/

or by simply downloading and burning the Windows 7 .iso from here:

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/win.../download.aspx

The top link is faster because it's only 120 MB and can be burned to a CD or
DVD while the bottom link is 2.5+GB.

YOu may be able to repair this by choosing the command prompt from the
Startup Repair menu and running these 3 switches:

The menu I refer to is in this set of directions with a grey background.

http://vistahomepremium.windowsreins...airstartup.htm



bootrec /fixmbr
bootrec /fixboot
bootrec /rebuildbcd

Good luck,

CH

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" <guest@xxxxxx-email.com> wrote in message
news:eec233b00b8b6ca11c8a764c6ca4bbbd@xxxxxx-gateway.com...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/EBC...r+from+the+DVD)

and

You might try running checkdisk from the command prompt :

Check Disk - chkdsk

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...ndows-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

Hi Chad

I am going to try your suggestions. This is what I have discovered so far. I can see both windows applications and windows xp pro on my 2 hard drives. I can even list the files on my xp pro and the "recovery" portion of the vista hard drive. I am unable to list the files on my vista system. It says file system may be corrupted or damaged. I think some record (MBR maybe?) for vista may be damaged and the system can't boot up from the vista hard drive. When I try to boot up from the xp hard drive, I see the windows logo (not the "welcome to windows" screen) and then it restarts it at that time. I managed to even get the options of the safe mode but none of them work. When I try to "disable automatic restart upon system failure" I get a BSOD with the message to the effect of invalid disk mount or something like that. My guess is that it is looking for a vista system but can't find it.
I will try again with the vista repair and see if I can get anywhere. This is very frustrating and I have spent more than 2 days figuring this out. I just don't want to lose my data on the 2 hard drives.
Thanks so much.
Kash

HI CHad
I followed your instructions and created a cd with vista bootloader and another cd with bootsec.exe on it. When I try rebuilding bcd, I get the error:
Volume does not contain a recognized file system. Please make sure that all required file system drivers are loaded and that the volume is not corrupted.

Isn't vista on a NTFS file system? That's the one that shows up for my vista hard drive. Or is the file system something else for vista? I have kept all of my OS on NTFS systems.

Any suggestions?
Thanks
Kash

Hi Kash,

You could try running chkdsk /r at thecommand prompt.

Also worth making sure the Vista partition is marked as active, like this:

X:\sources>Diskpart

DISKPART> sel disk 0

Disk 0 is now the selected disk.

DISKPART> sel par 1

Partition 1 is now the selected partition.

DISKPART> detail par

Partition 1
Type : 07
Hidden: No
Active: Yes
Offset in Bytes: 1048576

Volume ### Ltr Label Fs Type Size Status Info
---------- --- ----------- ----- ---------- ------- --------- --------
* Volume 1 C Vistax64 NTFS Partition 30 GB Healthy System

DISKPART>

If it is not shown as Active, type

DISKPART>act

DISKPART>exi

Then try the commands Chad posted.

Hi Chad & SIW2

Many thanks for your suggestions. It finally worked. I now have vista home premium working on my C: drive.
I entered vistaboot pro on my c: drive and changed the bootloader so that I have the option of selecting an OS (Vista or XP).

I think I am back to square one, where I started. When I select the XP system (now listed on D Drive), I see the list of drivers being executed followed by the Windows logo. After a few seconds, the system crashes and restarts. In other words, I don't see "Welcome to Windows" on a blue background. How do I repair the Win XP Pro installation? If you can help me in that regard, that would be great. I am happy though that I did get the vista back, and it's all due to your efforts.
Thank you ONCE AGAIN!!!

Also, what are things I can do to prevent such a recurrence? Backups of what? Any other suggestion that you can think of (in addition to steps for repairing my xp pro)?

Kash