GPT, MBR, AHCI Win7: alphabet soup

[videobruce]

My situation;
1. Existing 1 TB HDD; partitioned 10GB w/XP, 600 GB for media, 300GB for program, photo & document storage.
2. Increase the 1st partition to 20-25GB from the 2nd partition (resize both & merge),
3. Load Win7 64 bit in the first, replacing XP.
4. Retain the 2nd & 3rd partitions without loosing data (it is backed up elsewhere).
5. Save a image of 'C' to install a mirror O/S on a SSD.
6. Using a MB with a UEFI BIOS set to AHCI.

Questions; I know the hidden partition is MBR, but, when & where does the choice of MBR vs GPT happen? I've loaded Win7 on a small SSD, but I didn't see any choices.

I know I can just wipe the existing drive, but I would prefer not to unless absolutely necessary. If for nothing else, gaining the experience of doing all of this.

The more I have read, the more confusion this seems to be. I had less trouble 13 years ago with Win98 on my first PC build.

 

[ViRGE]

when & where does the choice of MBR vs GPT happen?

At install time. If you load the installer via UEFI, it defaults to GPT. If you load the installer via BIOS/CSM, it defaults to MBR.

And keep in mind that the hidden MBR is the protective MBR, to keep MBR-only disk utilities from trashing the drive. You shouldn't be touching it.

 

[videobruce]

Have you read any time that this 'automatic' process didn't work?
Is there a easy way to confirm if it actually installed that way?

 

[ViRGE]

Sorry, I don't have any more experience with the matter than that.

 

[glugglug]

I noticed installing Win7 with UEFI, that even in Win7, the UEFI loader intercepts the F8 key so there is no way to select safe mode at boot. Will a GPT/UEFI install be able to get to safe mode by using the "protective MBR" if I disable UEFI in the BIOS?

 

[ViRGE]

I noticed installing Win7 with UEFI, that even in Win7, the UEFI loader intercepts the F8 key so there is no way to select safe mode at boot. Will a GPT/UEFI install be able to get to safe mode by using the "protective MBR" if I disable UEFI in the BIOS?

No. A version of Windows configured to boot via UEFI cannot boot via MBR.

Though this is the first I've heard of Windows intercepting the F8 key like that.

 

[glugglug]

Maybe the menu could be from the BIOS? It is black & white styled like the Windows advanced boot options screen, not like the BIOS boot device selection though. But if it is a BIOS screen how does it know what OS is installed on each drive - it actually says Windows 7 in parens?

What comes up if I hit F8 is a menu to choose the boot device. Hitting F8 immediately after selecting the system drive still goes straight to Windows 7 without any other screen asking for Safe Mode or Network only mode etc.

Would have been nice when the boot was hanging after a botched eSATA controller driver install to do a system restore from within windows. After the failed boot it had options for system repair/restore or normal boot, and that restore ended up working. Not flexible like the normal system restore - it seems to just go to last restore point, not give you a menu of how far to go back, so kind of scary that I can never get to safe mode.

 

[videobruce]

Wouldn't that be the "Boot Manager" Windows installs as part of this 'new and improved' setup?

 

[fleshconsumed]

Maybe the menu could be from the BIOS? It is black & white styled like the Windows advanced boot options screen, not like the BIOS boot device selection though. But if it is a BIOS screen how does it know what OS is installed on each drive - it actually says Windows 7 in parens?

What comes up if I hit F8 is a menu to choose the boot device. Hitting F8 immediately after selecting the system drive still goes straight to Windows 7 without any other screen asking for Safe Mode or Network only mode etc.

Would have been nice when the boot was hanging after a botched eSATA controller driver install to do a system restore from within windows. After the failed boot it had options for system repair/restore or normal boot, and that restore ended up working. Not flexible like the normal system restore - it seems to just go to last restore point, not give you a menu of how far to go back, so kind of scary that I can never get to safe mode.

Hm... This got me curious because while thankfully I haven't had to use safe mode at all in the last couple of years, it can be a life saver in certain situations such as bad driver or a virus. So I googled and this is what I came up with:

http://windowssecrets.com/forums/showthread.php/144640-Can-t-access-Safe-Mode
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/b8/archive/...or-pcs-that-boot-faster-than-ever-before.aspx

Putting those two together it looks to me like you only have 200ms window to hit F8 after you select boot drive and hit enter. However, it looks like it's still possible, just extremely hard?

 

[Bubbaleone]

When the RTM became available I to was really frustrated with no (apparent) way to easily access safe mode, then I came across this nice little tut from How-To Geek: How To Boot Into Safe Mode On Windows 8 (The Easy Way).

Since then I've found a better method of enabling F8; Open an elevated command prompt and run this command:

bcdedit /set {default} bootmenupolicy legacy

Close the command prompt and reboot. F8 will now behave just as it did in previous Windows versions. To disable the F8 key and go back to the original Windows 8 setting, open an elevated command prompt and run the following command:

bcdedit /set {default} bootmenupolicy standard

Close the command prompt and reboot. The F8 key will now be disabled in Windows 8.

.

 

[glugglug]

It looks like the "bootmenupolicy" option is not available in Windows 7. :-(

But I managed to use easybcd & msconfig to add a separate F8 menu option with safe mode enabled.