Hard drive problem
Official PPRuNe Chaplain
Joined: Apr 2001
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From: Witnesham, Suffolk
SATA drivers: dunno! I just installed it and ran it. It didn't find the IDE drives, either.
Official PPRuNe Chaplain
Joined: Apr 2001
Posts: 3,498
Likes: 0
From: Witnesham, Suffolk
Well, DriveImage XML didn't want to play, but EASEUS Partition Manager did the business (thanks, Bushfiva) and the SATA drive is now partitioned and has a clone of the Win 7 boot drive on it. I've not sussed how to tell it to boot from that one, but that's for another day.
EASEUS is like the Partition Magic I used to use many moons ago. I'm not sure if I'm brave enough yet to use it to resize "live" partitions, but I think I'll give it a go once I've backed up the one that's getting a tad full.
The problem now is that I'm running out of alphabet for drives! I've even "recycled" X: which was the SCSI DVDROM drive that doesn't work because there are no Win7 SCSI drivers for the card. Some rationalisation may be called for.
EASEUS is like the Partition Magic I used to use many moons ago. I'm not sure if I'm brave enough yet to use it to resize "live" partitions, but I think I'll give it a go once I've backed up the one that's getting a tad full.
The problem now is that I'm running out of alphabet for drives! I've even "recycled" X: which was the SCSI DVDROM drive that doesn't work because there are no Win7 SCSI drivers for the card. Some rationalisation may be called for.
Joined: Jan 2008
Posts: 525
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From: LONDON
Congrats on that - good to see you managed to find a solution. Strange DriveImage XML did not work for you but then no two systems are the same.
You should be able to set you boot priority from your bios - so hit f2, esc, space or whatever it is to go in before you boot up
Cheers
You should be able to set you boot priority from your bios - so hit f2, esc, space or whatever it is to go in before you boot up
Cheers
Official PPRuNe Chaplain
Joined: Apr 2001
Posts: 3,498
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From: Witnesham, Suffolk
There's no telling what'll work and what won't. I've had software work perfectly on one machine and refuse completely on the next.
I don't think just changing the boot setup in the BIOS will get it to boot the "new" Win 7 clone config. Win 7 doesn't seem to do it that way.
The boot drive under XP is the first partition on the first (IDE) hard drive. That's pretty standard, I guess.
The present boot drive under Win 7 is the 4th partition on the second (IDE) hard drive.
The clone Win 7 is the second partition on the third (SATA) hard drive.
I'll try later telling it to boot from the SATA and see if it can work out where to go.
Off out to a theological meeting now...
I don't think just changing the boot setup in the BIOS will get it to boot the "new" Win 7 clone config. Win 7 doesn't seem to do it that way.
The boot drive under XP is the first partition on the first (IDE) hard drive. That's pretty standard, I guess.
The present boot drive under Win 7 is the 4th partition on the second (IDE) hard drive.
The clone Win 7 is the second partition on the third (SATA) hard drive.
I'll try later telling it to boot from the SATA and see if it can work out where to go.
Off out to a theological meeting now...
Joined: Jan 2008
Posts: 525
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From: LONDON
It all depends on how you installed Windows 7 as to where your Master Boot Record is (MBR).
If you installed Windows 7 on to the 4th partition of your SATA disk whilst booting from your IDE then I would imagine when you boot up you get a choice of operating systems. However no MBR will exist on the SATA disk because it used the primary partion on your IDE when you installed it.
If however you booted up with your SATA as your primary disk and installed Windows 7 then an MBR will exist on the SATA disk so the bios switch will work.
If you did the first way, you may want to trash your windows 7 setup and go the bios route and re-install so you get an MBR and then you can use the bios for deciding which one to boot into - most modern bios have the facility to allow a pompt and boot to select boot device so may be easier to turn that on. You may be lucky and be able to do an upgrade/fix on the existing installation but usually those are not available in the beta products.
If you installed Windows 7 on to the 4th partition of your SATA disk whilst booting from your IDE then I would imagine when you boot up you get a choice of operating systems. However no MBR will exist on the SATA disk because it used the primary partion on your IDE when you installed it.
If however you booted up with your SATA as your primary disk and installed Windows 7 then an MBR will exist on the SATA disk so the bios switch will work.
If you did the first way, you may want to trash your windows 7 setup and go the bios route and re-install so you get an MBR and then you can use the bios for deciding which one to boot into - most modern bios have the facility to allow a pompt and boot to select boot device so may be easier to turn that on. You may be lucky and be able to do an upgrade/fix on the existing installation but usually those are not available in the beta products.
Official PPRuNe Chaplain
Joined: Apr 2001
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From: Witnesham, Suffolk
It's doing what I expected: the "installed" Win 7 on IDE2 Partition 4 boots OK, as does the XP installation on IDE1 Partition 1. The cloned Win7 on SATA1 Partition 2 wasn't "installed" and is almost certainly missing MBR.
There are Linux distros on IDE2 Partitions 1, 2 and 3 and they all boot fine - except that Win7 zapped the Grub configuration that I was using till then for multi-boot. I suspect that a Grub boot would be able to launch the Win 7 on SATA1 Partition 2. I'll dig out a Grub boot floppy some time and try that.
I don't want to zap the Win 7 clone: the whole point of the experiment was to see if I could clone a new, bootable disk easily, from scratch. If I install Win 7 fresh on the SATA drive, I'm sure the installer will tell me it's too late for that (the Beta test is closed to new entries), and also it'll disable one of the other boot options (either the Win 7 on IDE2, or the XP on IDE1).
There are Linux distros on IDE2 Partitions 1, 2 and 3 and they all boot fine - except that Win7 zapped the Grub configuration that I was using till then for multi-boot. I suspect that a Grub boot would be able to launch the Win 7 on SATA1 Partition 2. I'll dig out a Grub boot floppy some time and try that.
I don't want to zap the Win 7 clone: the whole point of the experiment was to see if I could clone a new, bootable disk easily, from scratch. If I install Win 7 fresh on the SATA drive, I'm sure the installer will tell me it's too late for that (the Beta test is closed to new entries), and also it'll disable one of the other boot options (either the Win 7 on IDE2, or the XP on IDE1).
