Windows 7 Bad boot problem

[eko13wf]

Here's the story.

I had Windows XP on my original 500GB disk in my computer. We will call this DISK XP.

I bought a new 1TB drive and bought Windows 7 64bit to put on it. Call this one DISK W7.

I just recently moved all my old files from DISK XP to DISK W7 so I decided I wanted to format DISK XP to make full use of it. Before doing this I always got a selection to load either XP or WIN7 from a boot menu.

Here's the problem. I go to format DISK XP and restart. Now upon reloading I got bootmgr is missing from the DISK XP drive when only that is in and some other error saying the no system disk is inserted when I put the DISK W7 in only.

I loaded Windows 7 onto DISK XP and am posting from it now. When in Windows here, I see my other disk and can access all the files.

Now, what in the world happened and how can I restore my DISK W7 to work and load normally without reinstalling Windows on it and/or reformatting. I have 900GB of data on that drive I cannot lose and would prefer to not have to manually reload all of it.

 

[cybercore]

Windows 7 features - Startup Repair - Microsoft Windows

Use the repair option (boot from 7 dvd).

 

[Saltgrass]

As cybercore mentions, you can use the Win 7 install DVD, Repair, startup repair option to restore the boot to the Win 7 drive. If it originally loaded the boot files on the XP drive, for the repair to work correctly, you need to make the Win 7 partition on the Win 7 disk active. Use disk management to do this, then disconnect the XP drive or set it to secondary in the bios. Boot to the Install DVD and do the startup repair.

You will now have a basic Win 7 install on the Win 7 drive. You will have to redo the Boot Menu, which is not that hard, let us know.

 

[eko13wf]

I'll try this when I get home. My problem was that loading from the DVD, my computer doesn't even recognize that hard drive before getting into Windows.

 

[cliffdodger]

You must have resolved the HDD driver issue when you installed Win7? Do the same steps during the repair (provide the needed drivers when asked) and HDD access shouldn't be any issue.

I had a similar issue with an XP machine on my network and I actually had to build a custom XP CD with the RAID drivers for the PC pre-installed to fix it as I had no floppy drive or any method of supplying the drivers during boot.

 

[eko13wf]

Well that's the weird part. I got a no-system-disk error with only that disk. The other disk loaded with WIN7 showed it immediately and active once I got into the OS there. I already have the original 1TB drive set as the first load in BIOS.

I'm actually an IS major that just graduated but I've just never had a problem like this before.

 

[eko13wf]

Someone on another forum linked me to a program called Easy BCD Creator. If I can't get the other solutions to work, would this be viable if anyone has experience with it?

 

[Saltgrass]

EasyBCD will set up dual boot scenarios, but is not necessary here.

Please take a snipping tool picture of your Disk Management window and attach using the paperclip.

When you boot to the DVD, the Win 7 partition has to already be active and the other drive removed or set to second priority in the bios. The install may not see the Win 7 install at first, but may take 2 or 3 runs to fix the problem.

After I see the picture, I might recommend and easy command you can run.

 

[eko13wf]

I'm all fixed up. I used Easy BCD, unplugged the secondary drive, booted from the DVD and did a startup repair. Immediately loaded after restarting. Thanks for all the input.

 

[eko13wf]

The only odd thing I saw after loading was a dialog saying Windows needed to restart to take changes.