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How to make xp partition bootable

22K views 4 replies 2 participants last post by  fcortes 
#1 ·
Hello

set up

2 partitions, c and d, c has my windows files (xp pro), d is pretty much empty*


task

I need to get my system to be able to boot from c:

issue/problem

1. somehow my active partition is d, but all my windows files are in c. (d is currently the active partition but d has 3 key boot files that are allowing me to start the my only windows stallation (residing in c)
2. d has 3 critical files (ntldr, boot, and config), if I were to remove this files, I'm not able to boot. (I have tried.. as you can see below)

what I have tried

1. I have run fixboot and fixmbr from winxp pro install media. no change.
2. I have tried to make c the active partition with knopixx live cd and I have put the critical files mentioned above within the c (which seem pretty logical to me but somehow no change, I get an error message ( I can't recall the message exactly but it's basically telling me that I have no boot disk where they systems looks at.

How I came to have the problem

I'm not sure
I had cleaned installed win xp on c, and I had left d for data, then I installed linux with wubi and I used d for my linux/ubuntu/wubi file installation. then I had some problems with my windows installation so I had to clean reinstall windows on c, when I came to check how my system was booting somehow d was the active parition and this critical files came to be installed there, now, I need d to clean install fedora but I'm afraid I can use the d partition freely as long as my booting up is depending on that d partition.

I must be missing something..

any help is appreciated
 
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#2 ·
Boot into Safe Mode and copy those files from the D: drive and put them on the Root of the C: Drive. Now, rename the files on the D: drive (ex) NTLDR.old. Now boot with the XP CD and get to the Recovery Console and type FIXBOOT.
 
#3 ·
Hi

thank you for the reply

My apologize.. being busy and I've been meaning to try out your solution until I had some time off after work today

Unfortunaly it didn't work, instructions were followed to the line but I end up with a message that my ntldr was not found (ctrl -alt -del)

so.. I put my system they way it was..

a few observations

1. when windows boots "normally" my root drive shows to be c: and d: is where my working boot files are (boot.ini, ntdetect and ntldr), c is where I have my windows files.
2. when I log into recovery console I get a prompt leading me to believe that I got the opposite to what I get in the previous point: d:/windows. when I do map I get c: being my "within-windows" D drive, in other words the drive letters are transposed
3. when I executed fixboot, it asked me if wanted to apply the comand on C: which made sense... but did not work. I tried also to apply fixboot on D: and still the same result.
3. as I was making the .old files back to normal to boot up again, I run within pe.. this mbrwizard utility.. this is what came up:

1: List MBR entries

Running: mbrwiz.exe /list

MBRWiz - Version 1.52 for Windows XP/2K/PE November 13, 2003
Copyright (c) 2002-2003 Roger Layton MBRWizard! - The MBR Management Utility

Disk: 0 Size=238G
Pos MBRndx Type/Name Size Active Hide Start Sector Sectors
--- ------ ---------- ---- ------ ---- ------------ ------------
0 0 0F-EXTEND 100G No No 16,065 204,780,555
1 1 07-NTFS 80G Yes No 204,796,620 163,846,935


Press any key to continue . . .

also in win pe I got c: being my within-windows D: drive and d: being my "within-windows" C: Drive, so 0 actually refers to winthin-windows C and 1 refers to my within-windows D

I doesn't make ses that Disk 0 shows extended... Only God knows how it got like that but I think that maybe the culprit.. shouldn't that have to be a Basic Partition?
 
#4 ·
1. Go to Start/Run and
2. Type CMD and hit enter
3. At the prompt type diskpart
4. then after the > symbol type list disk

DISKPART> list disk

Disk ### Status Size Free Dyn Gpt
-------- ---------- ------- ------- --- ---
Disk 0 Online 28 GB 1536 KB
Disk 1 Online 233 GB 993 KB


5.Now select the disk which you want to make INACTIVE (For instance if i want to make my Disk 1 as active i.e where the OS is installed and REQUIRED to boot, i need to select the drive which i want to make INACTIVE. In my example DISK 0)

DISKPART> SELECT DISK 0
Disk 0 is now the selected disk.

6. Type list partition

DISKPART> list partition

Partition ### Type Size Offset
------------- ---------------- ------- -------
Partition 1 Primary 28 GB 1024 KB

7. Since there is a single partition on DISK 0, select it by issuing the command select partition 1

DISKPART> select partition 1

Partition 1 is now the selected partition.

8.Type inactive - this will make disk 0 partition 1 as inactive

THERE SHOULD BE ONLY ONE ACTIVE DRIVE SO YOU CANT SET MORE THAN ONE DRIVE AS ACTIVE
 
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