Win 7 and Vista dual boot ideas?

4743hudsonj

right, so i have win7 rc1 and vista home premium on my new shiny laptop, vista on partition 1 (C) with 100gb and win 7 on partition 2 (D) 300gb.

when i start the comp it dual boots to either no problem but im quite fond of windows 7 now (well compared to vista) and im wondering if theres anyway to make the computer automatically go into windows 7 without asking me on the dual boot screen. and lets say i want to go into vista for some reason, i could press something so it gave me the choice..

as i said its new so it has no files on it so i dont mind jigging stuff around if needs be, but i do need to keep vista as its pre-installed and i do want it in case theres a program witch win 7 cant run or if i havnt got the cash to spend on it when the rc1 expires and im left with out an os. i dont mind kubuntu but i just prefer the versatility of windows based programs that i just cant run on linux with all the faf of vm's and stuff

so any ideas or am i asking the impossible?

fwor

This answer is for XP, but I don't think it's changed since:

Either manually edit boot.ini at the root of the bootable partition (almost certainly on your c: drive), or just run msconfig and pick the boot.ini tab. Change the default= statement to point to the Win7 install instead of the Vista one. If you set the timeout= statement to, say, 5 seconds, the menu will flash up for a short period for the cases when you need to choose Vista instead.

4743hudsonj

fwor wrote: »

This answer is for XP, but I don't think it's changed since:

Either manually edit boot.ini at the root of the bootable partition (almost certainly on your c: drive), or just run msconfig and pick the boot.ini tab. Change the default= statement to point to the Win7 install instead of the Vista one. If you set the timeout= statement to, say, 5 seconds, the menu will flash up for a short period for the cases when you need to choose Vista instead.

thankyou, thats exactly what i was thinking but ive never done it so didnt even know if its possible.

[Deleted User]

You can use EasyBCD to do it quite easily.

4743hudsonj

anewhope wrote: »

You can use EasyBCD to do it quite easily.

id rather stick to the other method, i have the time down to 3 second but i just want to confirm how to make it "point" (as fwor put it) to windows 7, i have a good idea but i might as well make sure and ask

fwor

I usually do these things by example, but I don't have a PC here that uses the Windows bootloader - they all use GRUB.

I think all you do is copy the complete path of the Win7 install from the "Operating Systems" section and paste it after the default=

Fortunately it's one of those things that you can get wrong and not end being unable to boot...

4743hudsonj

fwor wrote: »

I usually do these things by example, but I don't have a PC here that uses the Windows bootloader - they all use GRUB.

I think all you do is copy the complete path of the Win7 install from the "Operating Systems" section and paste it after the default=

Fortunately it's one of those things that you can get wrong and not end being unable to boot...

got it working, works a dream


thankyou!

[Deleted User]

4743hudsonj wrote: »

id rather stick to the other method, i have the time down to 3 second but i just want to confirm how to make it "point" (as fwor put it) to windows 7, i have a good idea but i might as well make sure and ask

The reason I suggested that utility was because Windows Vista and 7 don't use boot.ini, they use a different way which can be more complex and easy to get wrong, whereas that program can do it in just a few clicks..

Edit: All's well that end's well, glad you got it sorted out.

4743hudsonj

anewhope wrote: »

The reason I suggested that utility was because Windows Vista and 7 don't use boot.ini, they use a different way which can be more complex and easy to get wrong, whereas that program can do it in just a few clicks..

Edit: All's well that end's well, glad you got it sorted out.

yeh thanks anyway, i got a mate to do it while i look at his hjt log. collective minds ftw!

butterbeanmash

Just in case anyone else is wondering, it's one heck of a lot easier to do this;

Start >

Computer > Properties > Advanced System Settings (left hand side) > [UAC-continue] > Advanced > [Startup and Recovery] Settings

and set which OS boots, and how long you have the choice for. No third party programs or manual registry edits.

Hope this helps.

4743hudsonj

butterbeanmash wrote: »

Just in case anyone else is wondering, it's one heck of a lot easier to do this;

Start >

Computer > Properties > Advanced System Settings (left hand side) > [UAC-continue] > Advanced > [Startup and Recovery] Settings

and set which OS boots, and how long you have the choice for. No third party programs or manual registry edits.

Hope this helps.

i think thats what my mate did

it looked easy enough