Member Avatar for faizaan_89

Hi friends,

I was having two o.s installed windows 7 & windows xp sp3

at that time i was getting o.s selection menu at start time.

But now i have formatted my windows 7 partition and reinstalled it now

i am not getting any o.s selection menu at start up and directly windows 7

starts so can any one suggest how to get that o.s selection menu back.


waiting for reply.

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  • Latest Post Latest Post by Shade01

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— reinstalling Win7 commonly leaves the Windows 7 boot manager in charge, so XP needs its legacy loader files and a correct ARC path to be chainloaded. and were right to look at the boot pieces, but when XP immediately restarts after selecting it, three things are worth checking before a full repair: where NTLDR/NTDETECT.COM live, whether the BCD/boot.ini points to the right partition, and whether a SATA/driver mismatch is causing an immediate crash.

From Windows 7 (no XP boot required):

  • Open Disk Management and note which partition is marked "System" (the active boot partition). If Windows 7 created a 100MB System Reserved partition, that is the one bootmgr uses.
  • Ensure both NTLDR and NTDETECT.COM are in the root of the system/active partition (not only on the XP partition). If the legacy BCD entry points to the active partition, those files must be there.
  • Check (or create) a boot.ini on the active partition and make sure the ARC path references the correct partition number for XP. Example boot.ini (edit partition(x) to match XP’s partition):
    [boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect

    Always back up any file before editing.

Driver/BIOS mismatch: If Win7 was installed with the controller in AHCI or RAID mode and XP lacks those drivers, XP will blue-screen and reboot immediately. Check BIOS SATA mode (IDE/Compatibility vs AHCI/RAID). If unsure, try the mode XP originally used. If switching breaks Win7, switch back and consider adding the proper mass‑storage drivers to XP or performing a repair install.

If these checks fail, the XP install is likely damaged or its boot entry needs rebuilding (Recovery Console copy of NTLDR/NTDETECT.COM, bootcfg /rebuild, etc.). Because those steps change low-level boot data, back up the BCD (or use EasyBCD) before proceeding and follow ’s advice about using XP media if needed.

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Member Avatar for Adamsappleone

Sounds like the reinstall of Win 7 corrupted the NTLDR file in Xp.
Just looking back at your question, I noticed you said "my windows 7 partition", does this mean you have both OS's on 1 hard drive (2 partitions)? The ideal set-up for dual booting is to have each OS on their own (separate) drive.
Anyway, have a look here and see if this will help;

http://www.ehow.com/how_4900122_use-easybcd-windows-xp.html

To repair the NTLDR in XP if and only, it is missing or corrupt, use your XP Installation CD to do a Repair/Install using the Recovery Console.

Member Avatar for faizaan_89

Yes i am having both w7 & xp sp3 installed on same hdd on diffrent partition .
I used easybcd software and it is giving information about boot manager as below.

Windows Boot Manager
--------------------
identifier {9dea862c-5cdd-4e70-acc1-f32b344d4795}
device partition=C:
description Windows Boot Manager
locale en-US
inherit {7ea2e1ac-2e61-4728-aaa3-896d9d0a9f0e}
default {ad3c2927-bdd3-11de-ad76-e81e83152ab9}
resumeobject {ad3c2926-bdd3-11de-ad76-e81e83152ab9}
displayorder {ad3c2927-bdd3-11de-ad76-e81e83152ab9}
{466f5a88-0af2-4f76-9038-095b170dc21c}
toolsdisplayorder {b2721d73-1db4-4c62-bf78-c548a880142d}
timeout 30

Windows Boot Loader
-------------------
identifier {ad3c2927-bdd3-11de-ad76-e81e83152ab9}
device partition=C:
path \Windows\system32\winload.exe
description Windows 7
locale en-US
inherit {6efb52bf-1766-41db-a6b3-0ee5eff72bd7}
recoverysequence {ad3c2928-bdd3-11de-ad76-e81e83152ab9}
recoveryenabled Yes
osdevice partition=C:
systemroot \Windows
resumeobject {ad3c2926-bdd3-11de-ad76-e81e83152ab9}
nx OptIn

Windows Legacy OS Loader
------------------------
identifier {466f5a88-0af2-4f76-9038-095b170dc21c}
device partition=F:
path \ntldr
description windows xp sp3

I copied ntdlr file from my friend's pc and pasted in my xp sp3 partition.

Now i am getting o.s selection menu at startup but when i am trying to boot in xp sp3 it restarts pc (before pasting ntdlr file it used to give error) , i am able to boot in w7.

pls reply..

Member Avatar for Adamsappleone

Can you get XP to boot in to Safe Mode?
If you can, try this;

1. Go to Start -> Control Panel -> System (Windows+Pause works, too)
2. Go to Advanced
3. Under the Startup and Recovery section, click Settings...
4. Under System Failure un-check "Automatically restart"

Member Avatar for faizaan_89

No i am not able to boot in safe mode .

Member Avatar for Shade01

Use your xp cd and use the second repair option. It will repair the corrupt installation and should allow you to boot into xp thereafter.

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