How to change the OS title in the "Choose OS screen"

[logicalprotocol]

Hello all.

I have a new computer built up. In it I have 2 60g Barracuda Seagate HD's. Both are running Win XP PRO. The problem is that on startup windows automatically asks which one to boot. And of course both say the exact same thing. So trying to figure out which is which can be a little time consuming.

My question: Is there a way to change the titles? I want one hard drives XP choice to say Xp -2, and the other to be XP -1. This is of course just so I can see the difference.


Even more so: Can I make it always boot to one or the other?

Thanks

 

[crisp82]

You need to edit the boot.ini file. To change the boot text, you need to change the MBR I think, but to make it boot to one, simply delete the other option (again, I think).

I wouldn't advise messing around with this.Can completely screw your system.

 

[logicalprotocol]

Thanks. I am going to give it a shot as the system is brand new and nothing to lose. If it messes up I will just reload everything in.

 

[crisp82]

It is worth a shot. If you get any probs, run repair install on boot from cd, then run 'fixboot' and/or (depends on partitions) 'fixMBR'

 

[bsobel]

Originally posted by: crisp82
You need to edit the boot.ini file. To change the boot text, you need to change the MBR I think, but to make it boot to one, simply delete the other option (again, I think). I wouldn't advise messing around with this.Can completely screw your system.

There is nothing in what he asked to do that has anything to do with the MBR. Your boot.ini will look something like this:


[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="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect

Of course you'll have multiple lines for each OS you added. The part in quotes (the 'Microsoft Windows XP Professional' in the above example) can be edited to say anything you like. To default which one gets loaded set the default= entry to the arc path (the portion of the "multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect" string BEFORE the = sign to match the one you want.

Bill

 

[crisp82]

Chill, still with the stress........

 

[snidy]

Why do you want a dual boot with the same OS?

 

[bsobel]

Originally posted by: snidy
Why do you want a dual boot with the same OS?

I've seen people do this for a bunch of reasons (one common one is to have a testing environment for software if you can't afford vmware)

Bill

 

[crisp82]

I am currently dualbooting the same Os because it helps me trouble shoot problems,

 

[logicalprotocol]

bsobel> Thank you. I will do this asap.

snidy> The reason is for redundancy, and in the event I need to swap out a HD.

 

[logicalprotocol]

One more question: Where is boot.ini?

I did a search and only found boot.ini.backup.

 

[crisp82]

Lol!!! I have had the same problem.......

 

[logicalprotocol]

I found it. I guess you cannot use XP's search feature to find it. But I went right to C:/ and voila. It was looking right at me. I did the recommended above and it worked great.