Solved! SSD and HDD dual boot on old X58 MB

[john_jay]

late to the party i know but i'm finally upgrading to a SSD. i've been on W7 til now and have had the same rig for a good few years so want to keep the OS while i slowly install everything i need (and there's a lot) on the new SSD (which i've installed W10 on).

most issues i've read about doing this is that the new SSD isn't recognised in the BIOS. i have the opposite problem - i've installed W10 on the SSD in AHCI mode but now that i've reattached the old hard drives they are visible and accessible in W10 and in the BIOS but aren't available as boot options.

ideally i'd like to be offered the choice between booting to W7 or W10 on startup, but will settle for switching boot order in BIOS and hope that's possible.

P6X58D-E MB
Samsung 860 EVO 500GB (W10)
WD Enterprise HDD (W7)

any suggestions on how to make the HDD visible as a boot option and how to enable dual boot?

 

[john_jay]

update

if i disconnect the SSD then the HDD is recognised and W7 boots up without me having to do anything. if i connect the SSD again then the BIOS no longer recognises the HDD as a boot option. i suppose i could just disconnect the SSD drive when i need to boot to W7 but it's hardly ideal...

have already updated to the latest BIOS and have tried connecting the SSD to both the Intel SATA II ports and the Marvell SATA III but no difference in behaviour.

 

[aigomorla]

You can set boot device @ post. It is called Boot Menu and I think tis like F8 or F12 @ POST, depends on the motherboard.
You can also reinstall another OS on top of the same drive, and that would give u a boot menu, but that would also clutter things on your SSD.

 

[VirtualLarry]

There's actually TWO LEVELs of boot options. There's HDD/CDROM/Floppy/USB, and then UNDER EACH OF THOSE, is a "Ranking" for which drive is FIRST, depending on how many of each of those drive types are POPULATED.

So, if you have two HDDs connected, and select "HDD Boot" as the primary boot option, the default FIRST HDD in the "HDD Boot Priority" will be the boot drive, unless you ALSO go into the "HDD Boot Priority" menu, and adjust the order of the HDDs.

I think that's what's throwing you for a loop. This is on pre-UEFI BIOSes.

 

[john_jay]

thanks to both of you - your posts have filled in the blanks and now i can see all my drives in BIOS (thanks Larry) and can choose my boot drive @ post (thanks aigomorla).