The technological Challenge: Dual boot SATA and IDE

PUTALE · SirTweaksabit Joined: 04 Feb 2005 Posts: 361

All right, guys. I have been trying to do this but can't get it to work, so maybe someone smarty here can help.
I have 2 HD, 1 sata and 1 ide.
Now I have the sata as my primary (C) where I have installed windows xp. Now I want to make a dual boot on the primary partition of my IDE HD. I can sucessfully install the OS(well the first part of installation when you pop in the CD and it copies all files to the HD. Now, after it reboots, my system automatically boot into my C windows. I have mess with the bios to make my ide as primary boot HD, but it's not working. I add dual boot under xp but not working. I don't know what to do. Anyone can help? thanks.

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gmoney · Posted: Tue Feb 22, 2005 12:29 am Post subject:

urhm so u have set the boot device 1 to boot offa ur ide channel.. have u hit f8 for boot options ... ? u can try to unplug ur sata.. install windows fully on ur ide and see what happens when u plug ur sata back in

PUTALE · SirTweaksabit Joined: 04 Feb 2005 Posts: 361

yeah, tried the f8 options and bios.

about unplug the system, would it work? did you tried?

gmoney · Posted: Tue Feb 22, 2005 1:21 am Post subject:

PUTALE · SirTweaksabit Joined: 04 Feb 2005 Posts: 361

I know, I am just curious as if you have tried it. Since I got windows on the sata hd already, I dont want to risk of not be able to boot it up if I mess up the boot loader:).

gmoney · Posted: Tue Feb 22, 2005 2:48 am Post subject:

well with ur computer off unplugging the sata wont mess any thing.. boot into bios.. set it to boot offa the ide drive.. complete the windows install.. then... shutdown.. plug drive back in.. go into bios.. and set it to boot offa the sata drive again.. .and then see what happens pressing f8 .

fussnfeathers · Lord of the Tweak Joined: 14 Dec 2004 Posts: 2763

Gmoney has it more or less correct.

First off, what are you trying to dual-boot to, Linux? Or another copy of Windows?

Either way, you'll want to go to your C drive (your primary drive), and under Tools > Folder Options > the View Tab, check to make sure "View hidden files and folders" is marked. Then, in the root directory of your C: drive, look for Boot.ini. That's the file that tells your system what to boot into, when, and if you have a choice. Chances are, if you're installing two copies of XP, it's simply defaulting to the C: drive by removing the timeout.

The first line of Boot.ini should read:

[Boot loader]
timeout: 30 (where 30 is a 30 second timeout for you to choose the OS and drive you want).

If that's set to 0, or even as much as 5 seconds, depending on how fast your system loads, it'll default to the first OS in the list.

Now, if you want it to default to your IDE drive first (secondary OS install), without you choosing, you'll need to change a few things.

Normally, with a two-XP install, it'll look something like this:

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect
multi(0)disk(1)rdisk(0)partition(1)WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP
Professional" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect

Where the line that says "default" is, change that to reflect the secondary XP install........meaning, if your second drive is the mone marked disk(1), you should just be able to change that number to reflect that, making Windows boot to your slave drive, instead of the master.

Clear as mud, hey?
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gmoney · Posted: Tue Feb 22, 2005 3:32 am Post subject:

thats a good read..

PUTALE · SirTweaksabit Joined: 04 Feb 2005 Posts: 361