How can i get a boot menu to choose the OS for a dual boot system?

[mikef208]

I had Win 2K and Win ME on my system, but I had to reinstall ME, now I can't choose what OS I want to load, it automatically boots ME. How do i get the menu back that lets me choose between the two. Thanks

 

[Fastball]

I read this same question in another forum not long ago. I think it was Tech Support. Try posting this question over there.

EDIT: Maybe it was General Hardware.

 

[Fastball]

Actually, go here:

HERE

Some very helpful people over there.

 

[mikef208]

I will look at that thread, and i already did post it in tech support.

 

[zzzz]

You can try reinstalling win 2k and let the installation "correct" your previous installation.
for reinstalling Me, you should have done setup/ntldr but it is too late now...

 

[mikef208]

will that still work if I reformat and reinstall again? or is there an easier way?

 

[mikef208]

Where is the boot.ini file supposed to be at, mine is in a Partition magic folder on a partition that doesn't have the OS on it, does it need to be moved.

 

[blargyblarg]

boot.ini should be in c:\

 

[mikef208]

Thats what i thought, so I copied it into the C: drive and restarted, but I still don't have the boot menu?

 

[blargyblarg]

got this from zdnet, it says win98, but it is the same for win me. you will need the win2k boot disks, you can download them from here: http://www.drd.dyndns.org/index2.html



After Windows 98 has been installed, the boot screen asking if you want to run Windows 2000 disappears. The Windows 98 setup program is not dual-boot aware, so it deletes the Windows 2000 boot sector. This is why you created the Windows 2000 emergency repair disk. Boot your system with your Windows 2000 CD, and proceed into Windows 2000 setup. The screen asks if you want to install Windows 2000, repair your current installation of Windows 2000 or quit setup. Choose the repair option. The following screen will ask if you want to use the recovery console to repair or the emergency repair disk. Choose the emergency repair disk option. The next screen asks if you want to do a manual or fast repair. Choose the manual repair option. Three check boxes will appear, including: "inspect your startup environment," "verify your Windows 2000 files" and "inspect the boot sector." Uncheck the option to verify your Windows 2000 files and then continue. Windows 2000 uses your emergency repair disk to repair your boot sector and add the dual-boot entry into your startup boot screen.

 

[blargyblarg]

looks like bootpart should work:

http://www.winimage.com/bootpart.htm



<< To repair the Windows NT/2k/XP boot sector on Fat partition
Windows NT installs a boot sector that launches NTLDR and displays the Windows NT boot menu. If you lose this boot sector, BootPart can restore it.

Boot under MS-Dos (this can be MS-Dos 6.22 on your hard disk, on an MS-Dos bootable floppy, or the &quot;MS-Dos 7.0&quot; included in Windows 95 (you can obtain it by pressing Shift+F5 when Win95 loads). Then, enter the command :

BOOTPART WINNT BOOT:C:

>>

 

[mikef208]

I am having a problem, the second disk you mentioned didn't do anything, maybe I was missing a parameter. How do i boot of the Win 2K CD?

 

[Athlon4all]

First of all could you post your partition setup? It depends. If you had 2 primaries, then you may just need to set the Win2k primary to Active. If you had 1 primary that had Win Me, and then a Extended with Win2k, with the NT Boot loader on Win Me then what you would need to do is use Bootpart to set back the Win Me partition to NT, and then make sure Ntldr., Ntdetect.com, boot.ini are in the root of the Me partition. Yes also if you &quot;Upgrade' your Win2k install to Win2k it should fix itself. To boot the 2000 CD, just insert the CD and reboot and then you should get a message saying &quot;Press any key to Boot from CD...&quot; press something and then Win2k Setup should come up and you can reinstall.

P.S. I just responded to your private message.

 

[mikef208]

Wow, um okay

I have a Primary Active containing Win ME(C, then it has an extended partition in it which contains my Win 2k(D plus several other partitions. Okay then how do i use that boot part, is there instructions somewhere, cause if you just type bootpart it doesn't do anything. Secondly I tried to boot off the CD and I get an invalid system disk error, even if i change all my boot options to CDROM

Lastly, how can you have 2 primary partitions, i think i tried that back when i originally set it up and it wouldn't let me.

 

[Athlon4all]

Ok, to use boot part
1.download it and then put it on a Win 98 boot disk. Make sure this disk has CD-ROM drivers
2.Boot the boot disk, and then type &quot;Bootpart WINNT BOOT:C:&quot;
3.Go to C:, type &quot;DIR /a&quot; make sure ntldr., ntdetect.com, boot.ini are there. If they aren't then follow the steps below. If they are there then try booting
4. Insert windows 2000 CD, goto CD-ROM drive letter:\i386
5. Type &quot;Expand ntldr._ C:\ntldr.&quot;
6. Type &quot;Expand ntdetect.co_ C:\ntdetect.com&quot;
7. Try booting, if it works let me know

Oh and if Boot.ini isn't there then you will need to make a new one. Below is a sample one, if you do need to reconstruct it then tell me and I will help:

[boot loader]
timeout=3
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(3)\WINNT
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(3)\WINNT=&quot;Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional&quot; /fastdetect
C:\bootsect.dos=&quot;Windows Me&quot;

 

[mikef208]

I am an idiot, i just noticed that blargyblarg put that bootpart winnt boot:C: in his post, but I found it in the readme file anyway. Then you told me about it. I tried it and it did bring back the boot menu thing, and i can get into 2K fine, but now I get an error when i try to get into ME. It is something like

disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)bootsec.dos

Thta looks about right, but may be a little off, but when i try to boot to ME that pops up on the screen and it freezes there. I haven't done everything else you said, maybe thats why. I do know that ntldr, ntdetect, and boot.ini are all in the root of C:

 

[mikef208]

Also i noticed in the readme file that it was possible to put the floppy drive in the boot menu list, so that i don't have to set it as the first boot device, but I am a little unclear on how that is done. I am assume i need to add another line to the boot.ini file, but what should it say?

 

[mikef208]

Here is my boot.ini
[boot loader]
timeout=10
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINNT

[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINNT
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINNT=&quot;Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional&quot; /fastdetect
c:\=bootsect.dos=&quot;Microsoft Windows ME&quot;

When it gives me the menu at the top is a blank space next one down is Win 2K then the next one down is bootsect.dos so i must have screwed something up .

I found my mistake with the = sign in the botom line. I fixed that and now i see a blank line, then Win 2K, then Win Me

 

[blargyblarg]

to get rid of the blank space, you should make it look like this:

[boot loader]
timeout=10
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINNT
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINNT=&quot;Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional&quot; /fastdetect
c:\=bootsect.dos=&quot;Microsoft Windows ME&quot;

 

[Expandable]

Good info Athlon!

 

[mikef208]

Yeah i kind of figured that so i already took out that extra line, thanks anyways though. But now I have another problem. I can boot 2K fine, but when i choose the Windows ME it gives me an error saying

Win 2K could not start because the following file is missing or corrupt.
system32\ntoskrnl.exe

What does that have to do with ME and how do i fix it?

Also do you know what i need to do to be able to have the floppy drive as one of the boot choices.

 

[mikef208]

Still need help booting into ME, and putting the floppy drive into the boot menu

 

[mikef208]

Where did all my helpers go?

 

[Athlon4all]

Sorry, Bootpart will help you also. Type in a Windows 2000 Command Prompt: &quot;bootpart 0 C:\bootsect.wme Windows Me&quot; that should create a new bootsect.dos file (I just called it .wme just because)and modify Boot.ini appropriately.

 

[mikef208]

I created the new bootsect.dos file, what do you mean edit the boot.ini appropriately? I am still getting that dang error, and what do I do about put the floppy in the boot menu. thanks?