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Dual booting with both instances loading windows as c:

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Dual booting with both instances loading windows as c:

Postby mooney » Thu Feb 18, 2010 11:37 pm

I want to dual boot my PC into:
Windows 7 with my existing version of office
Windows 7 with office beta
When either system is operating the OS is on the C: drive (I'm old fashioned and am comfortable with having them on C:) also if microsoft has issues, I can reload an image and rebuild from there)

I successfully installer DualBoot Pro and can now dual boot (THANKS!!!) into both partitions of Win 7. However it isn't working quite like I'm expecting...

Current HD Configuration:
1st Partition: OEM Partition (this was a Dell Vista machine)
2nd Partition: Primary - Designated as Drive E: {not sure when it switched from c: to e: - but it happened during my attempts to dual boot prior to purchasing DualBoot Pro}
3rd Partition: Primary - Designated as Drive C:
4th Partition: Logical - Designated as Drive D for data disk (this is where I have all of my files)

When I boot into the default configuration (c: The third partition above), I get the following Partition utilization:
c: System, Boot, Page File, Active, Crash Dump, Primary Partition
e: Primary Partition

When I boot in the second configuration (E:), I get the following:
c: System, Active, Primary Partition
e: Boot, Page File, Crash Dump, Primary Partition

Dual Boot Pro shows the boot information as:
Default OS: Windows 7 with Office XP

Entry 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Name: Windows 7 with Office XP
BCD ID: {current}
Boot Drive: C:
Windows Drive: C:
System Bootloader: \Windows\system32\winload.exe
Windows Directory: \Windows

Entry 2
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Name: Windows 7 with Office Beta
BCD ID: {fd13d6e2-16d4-11df-9a95-bac3ef158c31}
Boot Drive: E:
Windows Drive: E:
System Bootloader: \Windows\System32\winload.exe
Windows Directory: \WINDOWS

It took me a long time to get to the question, but I wanted all of the information to be available the best answer.

My desire is to be able to:
1) boot into either of the Win7 instances.
2) Always have the operating Windows system as Drive C
3) Have my data drive (D:) be available
4) ideally (but not required) have the other windows instance hidden

Thanks in advance,
Brian
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Posts: 1
Joined: Thu Feb 18, 2010 10:58 pm

Re: Dual booting with both instances loading windows as c:

Postby Grav!ty » Fri Feb 19, 2010 12:30 am

If one installs Windows 7 by booting from the DVD, it will always see itself as being on drive C: no matter how many instances of it one installs. This is because of both Win 7 and Vista use "virtual drive lettering". However, each instance of Win 7 will see the other installations with pretty much random drive lettering.

I think the only way to achieve what you want is to have your data drive as drive E: and of course to install the second instance of Win 7 to what your first instance sees as drive D:. You should be able to change the drive letter for your data drive without any issues from within each installation. By the way, DualBootPRO will only change the drive lettering as seen by the BCD and not as seen by Disk Management or Computer.

As far as hiding each installation from the other, that will probably require third party partition management software and I am not sure you are going to get satisfactory results with this.

Hope that all makes some sense. See my screenshots for some illustration of what I mean. The red dot indicates to which OS I am booted:

From XPX86 The Reality

Image

From W7 Instance 1 "Virtual" Drive Lettering

Image

From W7 Instance 2 "Virtual" Drive Lettering

Image
Image

"The great majority of mankind are satisfied with appearances, as though they were realities, and are often more influenced by the things that seem than by those that are." - Niccolo Machiavelli
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