Dual Boot

[TheSuperiorOne]

Hi,

Im currently running Windows 7 on my c:\ drive, but I have a dual boot (also windows 7) on my D:\ drive...

However when I run the one on the D:\ drive... it renames my drives so that windows 7 is on c:\

I now want to remove the one on the C:\ drive,  however if i do this the computer wont boot... because that the original drive I installed Win7 on. How do i transfer the boot files to the other one, and make that the "main" boot.

If i remove the HD from the mobo, the computer loads up and says that i dont have a boot thing, and i need to insert a boot media, or restart?

any help would be goood =)

David

[Geek-9pm]

After reading your post I am not sure of what your objective is.

You can change the boot order in the BIOS.
When you install Windows 7 it will crate a boot menu for you, it needed.

Forget about which is the C: drive. That is retro, back to Windows 98. As for  Windows 7, it  assigns itself to a virtual C: unless you have a need to make it do otherwise.

In some cases you might accidentally alter some files that are needed for boot. When that happens you have to boot from your repair DVD, which you should have created earlier. You do a repair on the affected drive.

The system  I am using now is a wimpy P4 ASUS mobo. The AMI BIOS lets me boot from four drives. Two of those drives have valid mufti-boot menus. (One got bombed.) So I have five different working systems to boot from. But I have given up on learning how it works.     

The point here is that you can do it, but don't try to second guess how Windows 7 does the boot stuff. Just use the tools that Microsoft provided.

But if you must, you can use the BCD Editor.
http://www.pcworld.com/downloads/file/fid,64565/description.html

[TheSuperiorOne]

Ill try explain what it is ive done,

I too have an ASUS mobo, and can boot from 4 different drives, however the boot file was stored on my initial disk drive(c:\)

so... when i removed c:\

there was no boot device in my system...
(wouldnt recognise my 2nd installation of win7 on my f:\   --- as you say, when i booted up win 7 it recognised this as c:\)

i have solved this however (for anyone in future who is looking how to do this)

i formatted c:\ ... gave me a message saying there was no boot media (or something) so i fired in the windows 7 disk and repaired it... and it works =)

yay

cheers for your help tho

David

[Geek-9pm]

Glad you got it fixed! 

[patio]

Keep in mind in any dual-boot scenario no matter what flavor of Windows is being installed it will ALWAYS write info to the root of drive C:.

The only instance where this can be avoided is by installing Windows to a seperate drive with all other drives disconnected...
In this scenario the BIOS is used to determine which HDD boots...