Two Hard Drives 1

[KDENS]

I want to put XP Pro on two hard drives,
with no partitions. What is the correct
boot.ini file for the primary and for the
slave. My computer does not recognize the
slave drive. Jumpers are corrct

thanks for any help
kdens~

 

[braddds]

First things first, in order to have anything on a drive, ie: data or an operating system, you have to have partition(s). Next, have you already installed XP on the first drive or are you still trying to get the bios to see two drives? The boot.ini file has nothing to do with recognizing the slave drive...it is only used by XP to determine where it is installed so that it can run.

I'll assume you have XP already installed on the first HD and you're trying to add a second drive. You're problem lies with the slave drive. First, do you know for certain the 2nd HD works, have you tried it by it's self? Does the bios see the 2nd drive? If so then does the 2nd HD already have files on it? Has it been partitioned and formatted?

Please provide some more info so that someone can help you.

Cheers

 

[KDENS]

I will try and explain as best I can. Windows XP Pro
is loaded on two hard drives. Both hard drives work
perfectly. When I boot I'm not giving a choice as to
which hard drive I want to use. I have to go to set up
and turn one hard drive off, so the computer will boot
to the hard drive I want to use. By no partition, I meant
I did not want anything but XP on the hard drive. Sorry
if that caused confusion. I'm just trying to learn the
correct way to load two hard drives, with Windows XP.
And when I boot, I'm given a choice as to which one I
want to use. thanks for your help and time

 

[braddds]

Oh...I get it! I've included a sample (does not mean it will work for your situation) of a boot.ini that has 2 XP Pro OS's. But before you copy and paste this over your boot.ini file I'd recommend (strongly) that you backup your boot.ini first. Then rename it too boot.old. Create a new text file then paste it the following (below) into it and rename that to boot.ini.

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINNT
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINNT="Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect
multi(0)disk(1)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINNT="Windows XP Professional (2)" /fastdetect

Also i'd suggest you visit the following site before you do anything:

http://www.jsiinc.com/SUBI/tip4300/rh4397.htm#4

Hope this helps!

Cheers

 

[KDENS]

This is what I'm using and it works. But I still don't know how to load the hard drives correctly, without having to change the boot.ini. That is what I'm trying to learn.
Also there are numerous opinions on what is the correct
boot.ini file. But after three months, I'm still trying to find out what is actually correct.

Thank you for taking the time to help, and sharing your knowledge. If you can give me any more information it
would be greatly appreciated.

[boot loader]
timeout=20
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
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Windows XP Professional Disk 2" /fastdetect

 

[wolluf]

KDENS - if that boot.ini you posted is on the first XP disk, it should let you boot either installation. The first (default) entry will boot from partition 1 on first disk. The second entry will boot from partition 1 on second disk.

If it doesn't work (for second disk I presume), what messages do you get when you select it? Is there definitely only one partition on second disk (run diskmgmt.msc to check)? There are only 2 disks?

 

[KDENS]

OK, it looks like I've managed to confuse everybody. The boot.ini file I'm using works for both drives. My question is, what is the correct way to load XP on two hard drives. Every post I've read, web site and knowledge bases. All deal with XP and 2000, 98 or whatever. Not just XP, and that is where the problem is. The boot.ini files are different when you have XP and XP.

I don't understand how to load XP on two hard drives and get it right without having to edit the boot.ini. Like I said after three months of reading, I still don't know how to load XP on two correctly formatted hard drives and come up with the correct boot.ini files. I managed to learn how to edit the files, so the computer will give me a choice of which hard drive I want. It will work, but it is not correct.

So any help learning how to do this is greatly appreciated. If you have time, go to Microsoft, Goggle or where ever. And see what you get for and answer on how to dual boot XP

Thanks for your help

 

[wolluf]

The M$ way to dual boot XP with itself would be just to install it twice into 2 separate partitions (which may be separate drives too). The second installation should update the boot.ini file produced by the first to give a dual boot. Both installations will be booting off the boot sector on the first partition (drive). If you install the second with the first disconnected/hidden, it will create a separate boot sector on its own partition (drive) - including its own boot.ini (this means the installations are independent - if you wipe one, the other will still be bootable). You then need to either edit the boot.ini on the first partition/drive or run bootcfg from recovery console to add the boot menu entry to boot.ini.

If you do create independent installations, you could also use a third party boot manager (I use

http://www.boot-us.com

- many others like boot magic, system commander) to manage the boot menu (probably not necessary with just 2 XPs, but if you wanted more - can be a good idea).

 

[KDENS]

So basically I need to load the slave drive first. Then load the primary second. Loading the primary second, with the slave already loaded, it would write the correct files for both drives! Almost , as the slave drive would write it's self as rdisk(0) correct. I'm not to much for
running the recovery console.

Thanks for taking the time to help

 

[wolluf]

If both drives are connected, it doesn't matter which you install first - if slave first, then primary will become default installation (ie, will boot if you don't choose) - and vice versa (but that's easily configurable anyway).

 

[jward52]

Why not use software such as Boot Magic? There are many similar programs that will let you choose what to boot from, just ask the guy profiled in Maximum PC magazine a year or so ago - he had 36 verified OSs on one PC. Of course some were the same OS but different version numbers. Search Maximum PC's site for more info.