Windows 7 Removal of Vista from dual boot with Win7

[tejap]

Hello all,

I have created 3 partitions of 40GB size from my hard drive.I have installed Windows Vista in C: drive and Windows 7 in F: drive. I would like to remove Vista from my system as I am not using it. So I want to know whether there would be any problem if Vista is completely removed. I am placing a screen shot of Disk Management here:





Thank you,
Teja

 

[MikeHawthorne]

Hi

It is important to make sure that Vista is removed from you boot setup before uninstalling it.

When I removed Windows XP from my dual boot XP, Windows 7 set up I used a little program called EasyBCD. It is a simple boot manager that will allow you to remove Vista from from your boot options.

Once you set your computer to boot to Windows 7 only, and check to see that every thing is working normally you can just uninstall Vista from your drive.

It works great, I had no problems at all.

Check this link...

Download EasyBCD For Windows 7

Mike

 

[tejap]

Hi Mike,

So we need to remove Vista from boot setup first!
I will try doing that, but I have one more query : My Vista is in C: drive which is supposed to be the default system drive.So after uninstalling Vista ,is it fine to have Windows7 in F: drive ?

Teja

 

[MikeHawthorne]

Hi

It is very important that you make sure that your computer boots directly into Windows 7 before removing Vista, if Vista is still in the boot list then is will not boot at all if Vista is removed.

When you boot from Windows 7 then the drive that Windows 7 is on may become drive C:\ automatically at least it did on my computer.

I was surprised when I first dual booted XP and Windows 7, that which ever drive I booted from became drive C:\ when I looked at Windows Explorer. When I eventually removed Windows XP then the drive that had previously been drive D:\ just became drive C:\.

Try booting into Windows 7 as your computer is now and look at Windows Explorer and see if it shows up as C:\ or F:\. I was using 2 actual physical drives not partitions so maybe that makes a difference but even if the drive letter doesn't change it should not be any problem.

Mike

 

[tejap]

Hi Mike,

I have done what you have said. My computer has booted into Windows 7 without presenting any boot options!
But I am not able format the drive where Vista is present. How can I unistall Vista now?

Teja

 

[Saltgrass]

Seems like I have see this problem before in another thread. If you look at Disk Management again, you will probably still show C: as being active and system. All you have done is modify the BCD store to bypass the Vista Boot option.

To get rid of Vista, you will have to put the boot files on the Win 7 partition and then make it active. The boot files are bootmgr and a boot folder. I do not know how you got the Win 7 partition to show as F:.

You could do this by making the Win 7 partition active in Disk Management then running the Repair option - Startup Repair 2 or three times.

You might also use the bcdboot command to add the boot files. From what was in your first attachment, the bcdboot command would have to go like this because the Win 7 partition is F:.

bcdboot F:\Windows /s F:

Open an administrative command prompt and type the command and hit enter. Then close the window.

Both scenarios depend on making the Win 7 partition active.

You may want to download and burn a third party partition manager in case something does not work correctly. Partition Wizard or GParted should work well. Also test the boot first to make sure the burn in operational.

 

[MikeHawthorne]

Hi

I think you should do as he suggests, I didn't run into this my self, once I used EasyBCD to remove XP as a boot option the drive (Formerly D) showed as the active boot drive and as C: on my computer.

As I said the difference may be that I was actually using two different hard drives and not partitions.
Once I had switched the boot setup I didn't have any problem formating the old C: drive but as I said it was not the C: drive any more, it now showed a the D: drive on my computer.

A not so pretty option might just be to delete Windows Vista, and the other files you don't want on the drive without formating it leaving the boot sector intact.

If you have problems with Windows 7 giving you permission to do so this application is helpful.
Take Ownership Shortcut - Windows 7 Forums

Mike

 

[tejap]

Hi,

So far:
I marked the F: partition active in Disk Management and then when I restarted , it said:

Bootmgr is missing

I was worried, but thenI did Startup repair and restarted to see:

Windows 7 Professional in new volume C: (recovered)
(recovered)

It was not in C: though after I checked 'Computer', it was in older partition F: only.
The current Disk Management is like this:



So can I go ahead and delete the contents of C: volume or do I need to run the bcdboot command before that?
I am placing a snapshot of EasyBCD settings:


Thank you,
Teja

 

[MikeHawthorne]

Hi

Since it no longer shows a boot file on drive C: I'm guessing that it is safe to remove the data on the drive.

I am more confident doing this stuff on my own computer because I always have a system backup and boot disk for an easy recovery if I screw up but I don't see any reason that blanking C: should cause any problems now.

Post back and let us know how it goes.
You may even be able to change the drive letter to C: once you are finished.
You would have to change the current drive C: to something else i.e. "G" and then change "F" to "C" then you could change "G" back to "F".

I have done this on earlier versions of Windows but not Windows 7.

If anyone else has an opinion let us know.

Mike

 

[Saltgrass]

If you want to use EasyBCD, you need to join their forum download the version 2 beta which works much better in Win 7.

I believe there are some utilities that will change your install to a C: partition, but to do so, references in the registry will have to be changed during the process.

I would reinstall while you are still in a position to do so and get your install straightened out. You have not said what the D: partition is for, but if you have priorties that would not allow repartitioning the drive, that is certainly your decision.

I do not remember which version of Win 7 you have, but the Ultimate takes quite a bit of space, especially if you let it update all the languages. You might want to think about using a larger partition for Win 7. You can certainly do that from your current circumstance, but just something else to look at.

 

[cliffdodger]

Thanks for this useful information. I want to remove Vista from my computer as well and just run Windows 7. At least now I have some idea of how to do that. I'll check out that beta version of EasyBCD too.

 

[tejap]

Hello,

The issue is fixed. I was able to delete the C: volume after ensuring that the boot drive is F: and seeing that it has been marked system and boot in Disk Management(the others beeing active, crash dump, page file and primary partition). So I was able free my hard drive memory.
I have explored the option of renaming the drive F: to C: , and found that it is actually very dangerous to this.It can result in a non-bootable drive. So I've decided to continue with the same names.

Thanks Saltgrass and Mike for your timely help.

Teja