Dual Booting Win 7 & Win 7

[thedoc46]

Hi,

For some reason, I'm having problems acheiving this.

I want to run two separate versions of Windows 7 (32bit & 64-bit) on one machine, however I've been able to install on this Dell laptop.

Two separate partitions on the one HD. 1st partition everything installed fine, and I used the typical dual boot setup procedure for the 2nd. ie, leaving the 2nd partition free, and done everything at the time of setup (partition creation and format) Everything went through as it should do, ie copying windows files, expanding, installing feature and updates, then right until the end where it says Completing installation ! the error I'm getting is Windows is unable to start on this hardware. Same deal, if I reboot and just go to boot off the 2nd install / partition.

I'm thinking this is perhaps a licensing or purposely blocked issue, since this is a Dell machine and i'm using two separate Dell OEM Win7 discs to do the installs.

Anyone else encountered the same before?

 

[cokecan]

wild stab in the dark here......is the HDD set to AHCI in the bios?

 

[thedoc46]

wild stab in the dark here......is the HDD set to AHCI in the bios?

Yeah, I thought of that, it was and I tried setting it to ATA instead, but then it would BSOD on me. I'm going to go through one more time and try the install under ATA (knowing that i'll probably have to re-install my other working partition also) Just to satisfy my curiousity.

Not convinced of the licensing thingy, cos I've done this two two separate OEM's before, like Vista & XP both OEM lics, but perhaps Win7 is smarter?

Eitherway, I'll give it a ATA install and see what happens.

 

[thedoc46]

wild stab in the dark here......is the HDD set to AHCI in the bios?

Yeah, I thought of that, it was and I tried setting it to ATA instead, but then it would BSOD on me. I'm going to go through one more time and try the install under ATA (knowing that i'll probably have to re-install my other working partition also) Just to satisfy my curiousity.

Not convinced of the licensing thingy, cos I've done this two two separate OEM's before, like Vista & XP both OEM lics, but perhaps Win7 is smarter?

Eitherway, I'll give it a ATA install and see what happens.

Well I never !

Yep it does seem that the AHCI is the culprit and not a licensing issue !

Live and learn as they say !

Hopefully someone will find this thread before attempting the same windows 7 dual boot with Windows 7 and reading this will save them some time !

 

[Grenache]

Have you tried booting from the install dvd and going into the repair option, and using the command prompt try to repair the boot records?

The commands will be some of theres ones:

bootrec /fixmbr
bootrec /fixboot
bootrec /rebuildbcd

 

[Django x2]

Have you tried booting from the install dvd and going into the repair option, and using the command prompt try to repair the boot records?

The commands will be some of theres ones:

bootrec /fixmbr
bootrec /fixboot
bootrec /rebuildbcd

I think you'll find, he's fixed it. But well read anyway