windows xp and windows 7 dual boot issue: they won't

[colintyvu]

I read the complete step by step how to on setting up dual booting windows 7 and xp. I prepared all my partitions beforehand, and labeled them accordingly so there would be no confusion i. I installed windows 7 on my new SATA drive. Everything went OK, except that I never got a boot menu presented - to 7, it was as if XP was not there i.
I downloaded and installed, and ran, easybcd, and tried to add the xp menu entry manually. It asks for the drive, and the drive with xp on it is now, under windows 7, drive D (it is E when I boot xp). All necessary files (ntldr, ntdetect.com, boot.ini) are all on this drive. But when I try that menu entry, all the computer does is reboot. It will still only boot windows 7, unless I go into the BIOS settings and change the boot order of the hard drives (in this list, if I make the one with the Win7 partition nr 1, I can boot windows 7 and only that; if I make the one with the XP partition nr 1, I get my regular old boot menu from boot.ini (which also gets me into my wubi install of ubuntu). i
I would like to be able to boot into XP from the windows 7 boot menu, or, alternately, would like to boot windows 7 from the xp boot menu. (that would be even better). Does anyone have any pointers for me?

Thanks in advance.

 

[KenB]

Hi,

Try this:

In the BIOS change the boot order so that the drive with XP on it is first in the boot order.

Boot up XP.

Start > Run .....type in ....sysdm.cpl
On the Advanced tab, click Settings (under Startup and Recovery.)

You should see this:

Under System Startup, click Edit. ( see red box )

You will see something like this below:

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="XP on Drive 1" /fastdetect
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Win7 on Drive 2" /fastdetect

Your original should include this the line in red above.

You need to add the line in blue above.
You can change the text in between the " ......." to whatever you want.

You can copy and paste the line in red and then alter the number in rdisk

Timeout=30 will give you 30 seconds before the system will load the default O/S ( XP )
You can change this if you want.
File > Save

DO NOT change the line in red or anything else above it. If it is different from what I have posted please copy it and post it here.