Can't boot into windows

swabby · Joined: Feb 22, 2006 Posts: 153

I am setup for a triple boot. winxp32, vista Ultimate32, vista ultimate64 raid 0. Each OS is on it's own independent disk btw.

After doing a recovery of ultimate64 raid 0 with acronis true image 11 (i was having problems with ATI graphics drivers) I can no longer boot into it. I can still boot into xp and vista 32 but when i choose vista 64 at the options screen it gives error message file: c:\windows\system32\winload.exe is missing or corrupt.

I tried repair startup with the setup disk but didn't work. Suggestions?

Also, if I go into vista32 I can see the other two OS in my computer as D and E drives and winload.exe is in the system32\boot file of vista64.

system is home built, MSI K9a Platinum, running crossfire 2 x1650 pro grapics, raid disks are two 250 gig hitachi hdd, amd 64 x2 5600+, 4 gigs ram etc.... advise if you need more. Thanx.

swabby · Joined: Feb 22, 2006 Posts: 153

Well, i guess i'm just too far out in left field with this system. No responses in 6-7 hours. Ho hum i guess this is what i get for playing around so much. Broke the thing twice last weekend, even thought i'd fried the mb once but managed to fix both times. I'll figure it out sooner or later.

Still standing by however.

drwho07 · Joined: Nov 29, 2007 Posts: 2240 Location: Central FL, USA

Swabby,
Sorry you've not had an answer in 7 hours, but hey, ......... Rolling Eyes

Your first sentence makes no sense to me.
What's Raid 0 got to do with it?

Your motherboard is almost identical to mine and I dual boot to XP or Vista, using the Boot Menu in the bios (F11).
Each OS is on its own hard drive....that eliminates all the boot conflicts.
If I wanted another OS, I'd just add another HD.
* I'd never put two OS's on the same HD. That's just asking for trouble.

With six SATA2 ports on the mobo, there's no reason to put two OS's on a single HD. To me, that's just asking for problems.

Maybe someone will be along soon to give you better help than I can.
I just didn't want you to think you're being ignored. OK?

Y'all have a great day now, Y'hear?

The Doctor Cool

swabby · Joined: Feb 22, 2006 Posts: 153

Hello doc, thanx for the reply. Believe it or not I actually work for a living as well Smile

.

Just gave the info on the one system being raid for information purposes, since folks who are helping seem to want as many details as possible.

I do not change hdd's in bios to boot into differen os's. My setup has always booted to an os selection screen and I choose which os I want to boot into from there.

If I change the bios to boot to the hdd with vista 64 on it it doesn't boot to it. Never would even before this problem. The system boots fine up to the os selection screen it just doesn't want to boot into vista 64 (since the restore) while booting into the others just fine if i choose them.

Thanx again for the reply.

Baby_Tux · Joined: Mar 06, 2007 Posts: 1242

It sounds to me that your BOOT.INI file is not correct. Please post it alone with the layout of the drives - which drive has what OS & what partition it is on. I think I may be able to get you going. (as time permits)

swabby · Joined: Feb 22, 2006 Posts: 153

Hello baby tux, I don't think I am as proficient at this as you may be assuming. I'm not sure what you are asking me to do. But here goes.

I can find no boot.ini file in any of the three systems.
Vista32 has a boot folder in system32 that has winload (application) and winresume (application). Also an En folder is in the boot folder that has winload.exe.mui and winresume.exe.mui in it.

Vista 64 has a boot folder in system 32 that has those same files plus two efi files of the same name just inside the boot folder and two efi.mui files of the same name in the en file folder.

Win xp has no boot files or folders of any kind in it that I can find yet I believe for some reason that it probably controls the MBR. Then I am not sure I know what I am even talking about here.

xp was installed first, vista 32 was installed second and vista 64 was installed last. All was well until I did a restore of vista 64 with Acronis 11 image that I had stored on the vista 32 disk.

Probably didn't help you much so can't blame you if you can't help me huh. Confused

Baby_Tux · Joined: Mar 06, 2007 Posts: 1242

No, actually you answered more than you may THINK.
AND you installed everything in the correct order.

It appears that VISTA has changed what the BOOT LOADER is named now. From the description, it appears that you found it. It SHOULD be associated with the last OS you installed.

Can you get this:
right click my computer - properties -advance tab - click edit - post this page. (should be boot.ini)

Or post whatever bootloader you can get to & what OS. I suspect that the line that is SUPPOSED to point to your Vista64 is corrupt & just needs editing to point to the right area. - I've had this happen many times myself. Easy fix with the right info.

UPDATE:
Forget the italics above as (left for info)...
I did some checking & as I feared, VISTA changes the whole thing. (here is the info for those interested; INFO LINK)

So, I need you to do this;
run BCDEdit.exe (at command prompt) & post your findings...

drwho07 · Joined: Nov 29, 2007 Posts: 2240 Location: Central FL, USA

Apparently, my boot info was somewhat confusing.

I never change the boot order in the BIOS.
The rule of thumb for booting with SATA2 is that the mobo will take the first bootable drive that it finds, starting with port #0 and working upwards from there.

So, since my Windows XP drive is on port #0, that's my default boot drive.
Vista is on port #1 and my backup HD is on port #2 (it's for storage only and not bootable)

However my MSI mobo BIOS does provide a BOOT menu if I just tap the F11 key during boot-up.
It looks like this:

Error: image could not be loaded. Image is not available from server

Image URL: http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g90/DrWho1943/BootScreenF11.jpg

* This is an old picture and does not accurately depict my current drive setup. But NOTE, the SD Flash Card is selected for booting. I have Ghost 8.3 and 11 on this card.

It does NOT involve changing anything in the bios.
I even have a SD-Flash-Memory card that I've made bootable and it will boot my system just fine, from this boot menu.

I also have a five year old "ASRock" mobo that does the same thing with the F11 key. Go figure!

I hope this cleared up any misconceptions about what I was talking about.
(I really do hate misconceptions!) Laughing

Cheers mates!
The Doctor Cool

swabby · Joined: Feb 22, 2006 Posts: 153

Ok, I found a lot (running within vista 32 os. In this instance drives are: c:=vista 32, D:=win xp and E:=vista 64)but don't know how to upload it here and apparently it will not let me copy it so I guess I'll have to type it, so here goes: Smile

(btw, I put the dashes in there to better simulate spacing in command prompt since blank spacing pulled everything to the left when I submitted here. Alignment ain't that great but what the hay)

Windows Boot Manager
--------------------------
identifier------------<bootmgr>
device----------------partition=D:
path------------------\bootmgr
description-----------Windows Boot Manager
locale-----------------en-US
inherit----------------<globalsettings>
default----------------<default>
resumeobject--------<b7a00cd8-508d-11dd-9095-a17304072311>
displayorder----------<ntldr>
------------------------<default>
------------------------<current>
toolsdisplayorder----<memdiag>
timeout----------------8

Windows Legacy OS Loader
--------------------------------
identifier---------------<ntldr>
device------------------partition=D:
path--------------------\ntldr
description-------------Windows XP

Windows Boot Loader
-------------------------
identifier-------------<default>
device----------------unknown
path-------------------\Windows\system32\winload.exe
description------------Vista 64
locale------------------en-US
inherit-----------------<bootloadersettings>
bootdebug------------Yes
osdevice--------------unknown
systemroot------------\Windows
resumeobject---------<0cf11c41-5097-11dd-bf5a-e15811f7b81f>
nx----------------------Optin
pae---------------------ForceDisable
sos---------------------Yes
debug------------------No

Windows Boot Loader
-------------------------
identifier--------------<current>
device-----------------partition=C:
path-------------------\Windows\system32\winload.exe
description------------Vista 32
locale------------------en-US
inherit-----------------<bootloadersettings>
osdevice---------------partition=C:
systemroot------------\Windows
resumeobject---------<b7a00cd8-508d-11dd-9095-a17304072311>
nx----------------------Optin

Hopefully there aren't too many typos in there. If needed I'll be glad to re-check and edit at your request. Pretty cool stuff. I actually get a "sense" of what is going on at boot when I read it. Don't know what to do with it but.. Rolling Eyes

..... My analyses: win xp is the initial boot manager and vista 64 is the default os at the os selection screen which makes sense with my experience. But what is keeping vista 64 from booting into windows when I select it. Some of the settings above may be the result of my playing around with boot configurations running easybcd within windows.

Standing by. Very Happy

BTW when I run Acronis Disk Director at bootup it shows one "unkown" operating system, windows xp and floppy A: for my detected OS's or drives at boot. It seems to be picking up all drives on SATA as one unknown os. Those 3 drives, one containing vista 32 and two (RAID 0) containing vista 64, are never detected in bios.

swabby · Joined: Feb 22, 2006 Posts: 153

If I change device-unknown to device-partition=E:, would that do it?? Idea

But then how would I even do that since it will not let me edit within the command prompt.

Baby_Tux · Joined: Mar 06, 2007 Posts: 1242

swabby · Joined: Feb 22, 2006 Posts: 153

I'll let you know how it goes..

drwho07 · Joined: Nov 29, 2007 Posts: 2240 Location: Central FL, USA

Swabby,
Going back over the early posts in this thread, I noticed that you said you could not boot to a drive after you did an Acronis Restore to that drive.

I don't (and won't) use Acronis, but with Ghost, if you do a Partition to Image and then restore that image to a blank drive, the drive won't boot.
The "Partition Image" does not contain all the boot sector information required to boot the drive.
With Ghost, to be able to restore to a blank HD, you must use the Disk to Image format, so that all the boot sector is copied to the Image File.

Sounds like a minor difference, but becomes HUGE when the restored HD won't boot.

On my own system, in FAT-32 format, I can fix this problem after the restore by running FDISK /mbr on the HD.
That rebuilds the boot record and the HD will then boot up just fine.

Good Luck,
The Doctor Cool

swabby · Joined: Feb 22, 2006 Posts: 153

Hello doc, yeah what you are saying makes sense. I finally disconnected all drives and booted into os with each one independently. Got vista 64 back up after doing a repair off the cd that evidently fixed the boot file.

Began having problems again as soon as I hooked everything back up and just got vista 64 back up again. I am trying to set them up to run independently without doing a new install so each will have it's on boot with no dependency on the other.

I'll keep fdisk/mbr in mind in case I start having problems again. How exactly do you run it off the hdd? Is it doing that when using command prompt on the windows cd or do I need a separate boot floppy, like win98, or something?

Baby tux, thanx for the link on how to work with changing entries in bcdsetup, that came in handy. I had been reading another one before you put me onto that link and yours was simpler and easier to follow. I was able to delete an "unknown" store that somehow got created in the vista 64 boot file that was screwing it up. Right now I'm back in and think I'll just leave it all alone for a while. Getting a bit burned out. Very Happy

Baby_Tux · Joined: Mar 06, 2007 Posts: 1242

Here is my take on what happened...

As DOC pointed out, sometimes the MBR can get screwed up. With that, your bootloader got confused as to what the 64 partition info was to be (thus the unknown).
Fixing the MBR (as you did with the disk) gave it the info & fixing the "pointer" got you in.

Glad to see you got it working again. - BTW: I'd keep all this info as you MAY need it again. Best way is to click file > save page as > "HTML" That way if something happens to the site, you still have it. - As rare as it is, this (your problem) DOES happen from time to time. (been there myself)

& YES, it all can be quite draining...

(...for guy outside door)

swabby · Joined: Feb 22, 2006 Posts: 153

drwho07 · Joined: Nov 29, 2007 Posts: 2240 Location: Central FL, USA

Swabby,
DOS, FAT-32 and I are old buddies! Rolling Eyes

Every computer in my house has a Floppy Drive in it.
And, I have a USB Floppy Drive for customer's PC's with NO Floppy Drive.
I use a boot floppy that I made ages ago on my old Windows ME PC.
Anyone needing a copy of it, is welcome to it. Just drop me a PM.

FDISK is a DOS program and only works with drives formatted FAT-32.
Ergo, I can use FDISK /mbr to fix a HD that won't boot.

But, since I learned the trick about making Ghost Disk Backups, I don't have the problem with a Restored HD not booting.

To make a restorable copy of a Vista HD in NTFS mode, I use either Sea Tools or MaxBlast to make the backup image, to a separate HD.
Both work admirably!

Good Luck Sir,

The Doctor Cool

goretsky

Hello,

I have seen the behavior you experienced happen before when copying a a hard disk disk containing Microsoft Windows Vista Ultimate Edition x64 using Aconis True Image. As near as I can tell, the problem is True Image does not create the Boot Configuration Data data store correctly, resulting in a non-bootable Windows Vista installation. Booting from the installation DVD and doing a repair installation solves the problem, as you noted.

Regards,

Aryeh Goretsky

swabby · Joined: Feb 22, 2006 Posts: 153

Hello goretsky, I've been lookin you, as some say here in the South. Smile

. Interesting input. I have used v8.o of Acronis for years with XP with very good results. Because it is purported to not work with Vista 64 bit I spent another $29 bucks for Acronis 11 upgrade. I have not yet determined with certainty that Acronis 11 has a problem doing a restore.

After getting back into windows a half dozen times, each time I would do a reboot it would fail and I had to go through the fix process all over again. So I finally decided to do a clean install of vista 64 on this drive.

"First" thing I did after the clean install (even before installing AVG) I installed ATI 8-6 graphics drivers with CCC software. Sure enough, on first reboot it failed to boot back into windows. I removed all ATI software/drivers, cleaned up files and registry and had no problems on the next reboot.

I am able to boot into all three systems independently with no problems. Of course since I am running two cards, Radeon x1650 pro, on crossfire I must eventually reinstall CCC. As of now I don't know if CCC is the problem or the graphics drivers are the problem. ATI has come out with updated drivers/CCC software, 8-7, as of July of 2008 so will be installing that upgrade eventually in separate installs, not in one package.

I plan to make a restore point in system restore just before the install and to create a backup with Acronis 11 in "secure zone" before installing the ATI software and drivers.

I will report back here later after I have hopefully nailed down exactly what is causing the problem/s. Remember, the initial restore I did that started this problem for me was ATI drivers/software were having problems in windows. I did not connect that as causing my boot problems because I had not had problems booting until after the restore. So right now I am trying to determine which came first, the chicken or the egg or did they just show up independent of one another and establish their relationship, if indeed they have one in this case, at a later date Laughing

.

goretsky

Hello,

I have, generally speaking, had good results with Acronis True Image. The computer in question I was experiencing problems with was a Microsoft Windows XP computer with multiple disk volumes that was clean installed with Microsoft Windows Vista x86 Ultimate Edition and then x64 Ultimate Edition. Although the operating system disk volume was deleted and a new one created each time, I suspect there may have been some legacy issues due to the previous partitions on the hard disk drive.

One thing I noticed is that Acronis just released a new build of True Image 11 last month, build #8101. It seems to contain fixes for some issues with Windows Vista.

That is a very odd problem you are experiencing. I am wondering if the problem might be due to one piece of hardware interfacing with another component due to some sort of device driver compatibility issue. Have you installed the latest chipset device drivers for your motherboard, as well as a drivers for other hardware, such as the CPU (if required) and RAID controller (if separate from the chipset drivers)? If so, did that make any difference?

Regards,

Aryeh Goretsky