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| Thread ID: 131684 | 2013-05-03 23:56:00 | Boot Manager???? | B.M. (505) | Press F1 |
| Post ID | Timestamp | Content | User | ||
| 1339566 | 2013-05-03 23:56:00 | Ok, I have two old computers here one running XP sp2 and one XP sp3. Both have programmes accumulated over the years that I’d like to keep. One has a Hitachi 160GB SATA HDD and the other a 60 GB ATA IDE Maxtor HDD. Now, what I want to do is put both HDD’s in the one case and select at start up which drive I wish to boot from. I was thinking along the lines of a boot manager but I’m open to suggestions as to the best way to approach the issue. Reinstalling the applications is not an option as a lot were from places like Giveaway of the day. All help appreciated. :thanks |
B.M. (505) | ||
| 1339567 | 2013-05-04 00:37:00 | No need for any third party boot managers. Put both HDD's in the Case, when you start it up, go into the BIOS, Normally by pressing the Delete key as its starting, look at the bottom of the screen a few seconds after pressing the start button, it usually flashes across there what key to press. Once in the BIOS, look for the Hard Drive / Boot options, ( may be under advanced depending on your mother board) somewhere there will be the option to select the boot order / first drive to boot, select the one you want, save it, and when you boot it will boot to the drive you selected. Keep in mind if you are transferring HDD's from one PC to another, make sure the boot drive is the original Drive/motherboard -- you cant simply put a XP HDD onto another motherboard, as a lot of the times it will blue screen with the wrong drivers, unless you are lucky and its close enough to pick up the board and then install new drives for that board. |
wainuitech (129) | ||
| 1339568 | 2013-05-04 02:02:00 | Thanks for that Wainui. Yes I’m familiar with the method you suggest but was rather hoping I might be able to get a screen at POST asking me which drive to boot from. I remember a mate that ran Windows and Linux got one but that may have been a Linux facility. Yep both HDD’s are in the same case and by plugging and unplugging they both run fine with the Motherboard. I have had to install another Audio and Video Driver on the IDE drive but it runs fine for the moment anyway. No conflicts shown in Control Panel/System/Hardware/Device Manager either. I guess I’m looking for a programme that would probably sit on the Master Disk that would interrupt the POST whilst a decision was made as to which disk we’d boot from. Going waaaaaaaaaaay back I seem to remember it was done with DOS systems but then they would have had FAT formatted disks not NTFS. Just not sure about what I want or need, but I guess that’s obvious by now. :D |
B.M. (505) | ||
| 1339569 | 2013-05-04 02:09:00 | Hey Guy's, I've found THIS (http://gag.sourceforge.net/) anyone care to comment? | B.M. (505) | ||
| 1339570 | 2013-05-04 02:40:00 | Never heard of it | Speedy Gonzales (78) | ||
| 1339571 | 2013-05-04 05:53:00 | Wow, looking forward to choosing between 9 Os's!! Second thoughts, my one is enough. | linw (53) | ||
| 1339572 | 2013-05-04 09:25:00 | Hey Guy's, I've found THIS (http://gag.sourceforge.net/) anyone care to comment? GAG is very good. Works fine with all Windows up to XP. W7/Vista do not work on it because they have a different Boot setup. I will look for it somewhere in the many boxes. |
mzee (3324) | ||
| 1339573 | 2013-05-04 21:58:00 | Both the following are good - EasyBCD and/or VitsaBootPR. Google them. | Bryan (147) | ||
| 1339574 | 2013-05-04 23:18:00 | Update. I downloaded GAG, burnt a disk, booted from it and unfortunately it couldn’t see the SATA drive. I reinstalled it a couple of times and restarted it but no luck. However, the BIOS can see the SATA drive. So don’t know where to go with this one from here. Now I get the impression that this type of Software either works on prior Vista or post Vista but not both. I stand to be corrected on this count but both the subject disks are XP on NTFS formatted drives. Now I’m looking at Bryan’s suggestion of EasyBDC & VistaBootPR, but I’m not sure about them working on XP? Any thoughts on this? However, I guess it’s encouraging that there are programmes out there that are supposed to do what I want, but it gets down to getting one to actually work. :D |
B.M. (505) | ||
| 1339575 | 2013-05-04 23:31:00 | If it cant see the hdd / and if it crashes with a 0x00000007b stop error, it needs sata drivers | Speedy Gonzales (78) | ||
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