[Bitz]

On a Dell 546 running Windows 7 interrupting the boot sequence with F12 displays a screen where you may select the boot device. Mine shows, in this order, the internal hard drive, the CD/DVD, a USB attached Seagate external hard drive, Diagnostics and Boot to Utility Partition. My meager understanding is the BIOS points to the BootMgr located in the Active Partition and I assumed the information displayed was controlled by BootMgr. I was hopping to delete the reference to Diagnostics and Boot to Utility Partition with my purchase of DualBootPro. Dell calls the hidden partition at the start of my drive the Dell Utility (40MB) and a partition at the end the DSR (Dell System Restore). I have already deleted the latter which as purchased had an image of Vista and intend to delete the hidden partion (it holds diagnostic software that I have saved elsewhere). I now maintain my own images of Windows 7 OS.

I cannot find how DualBootPro might accomplish this modification (and cannot even display these messages using). Just how do modify?

Bitz

[NT50]

DualBootPro is not a partition manager program. It will not do what you are trying to accomplish.

[Bitz]

I apologize for not making myself clear. My problem is not one that partition managers can handle. I am trying to modify the instructions displayed when I press F12 interrupting the boot sequence and displaying Boot alternatives. Apparently I assume incorrectly that this information for somehow controlled by the Windows Boot Manager (BootMgr) which is invoked by the BIOS. Just where is the information I detailed and specifically the display of Diagnostic and Boot to Utility Partition maintained?

Bitz

[NT50]

The F12 boot instructions for the boot are embedded in the BIOS. You can not change them as far as I know. That is Dell's BIOS they have programmed on the computer.

[Bitz]

So where does DualBootPro fit in? I thought the BIOS loaded the MBR with code that pointed to the BootMgr which parsed the Boot Configuration Data file which enumerated the installed operating systems. Then to add to my confusion there is BCDedit which on my computer displays two Windows Boot Loader details, one with a description of Windows Recovery Environment and other Windows 7 (the one OS I presently have installed).

I hope you are willing to see if you cannot help me learn something about the boot sequence and how to control or point me to a good tutorial. I am interesting in dual booting and purchased DualBootPro hoping to be able to explore what was going on in my present simple configuration before messing it up<g>.

Bitz

[NT50]

The boot menu you see when pressing F12 is coded into the BIOS/CMOS straight from the factory or distributors (Dell, Gateway, IBM, Etc). You can not modify them without either wiping out the BIOS and installing another which is dangerous. If you make one mistake or install the wrong one you will wipe out the computer period.
As for the BIOS pointing to the correct harddrive for booting, you set that and leave it alone. You do not dual boot with that option unless you wnat to keep the OS boot process separate.
DualBootPro is a GUI program that utilizes the Vista/Win7/Windows 2008 boot manager commands and programs to get a dual boot process running and also backup the boot configuration.

The way a dual boot works is in your case, you have Windows 7 running and your Disk manager should also represent the hard drive with Win7 on it shoudl also be the System drive/partition.
You can then have XP on antoher partition or hard drive and copy ntldr, NTDETECT, boot.ini to the System drive/partition and use DualBootPro to setup you boot menu. The boot menu will be seen AFTER POST. You can then select your OS you wnat to boot to and your done.

Please see the guides below, maybe they will help you understand. I do not use the F12 function to dualboot.

Dual Boot Trouble Shooting Guide - XP / Windows 7 Running

Install Windows XP in Dual Boot with Pre-Installed Windows 7