Installing Windows 7 Onto New System With 3 Hard Drives - MBR Or GPT Partition?
Apr 30, 2012
I'm about to install windows 7 64bit, onto a new system, with 3 hard drives. One for OS and Data. Second one (SSD) will only be used for caching - fast boot. Third one for -printer-pagefile etc. System is ASUS P8Z77-V deluxe, which has UEFI. Do I need MBR partitions or GPT Partitions.
I built a new PC and I have my old hard drive. What I would like is to install windows 7 on each hard drive and at start up be given the choice of which one I want to start up. Is this possible and if so how is it done. I did a search and I don't think I know what this is called because while I get the impression from other threads that it can be done I can't find out how. So when the PC powers up I want it to give me the choice of using HD1 or HD2 and each HD having its own windows on it that is completely separate from the other HD.
I have 3 harddrives the primary i dont care if its formatted, thats the one the OS goes on. the other 2 have all my movies on it (3tb total, 1tb and 2tb drive) will these 2 extra drives be formatted as well or untouched? If they are going to be formated can i just upplug them and plug back in once 7 is installed note if it matters ill be installing Windows 7 unltimate NOT the upgrade?
I have a HP Probook 4530swith Windows 7 Home Premium 64 bit. When I turn on the PC the windows does'nt start and give a option of starting windows manually, which does'nt work, and repair windows. Repairing windows with windows 7I then decided to reinstall windows 7, but while installing, on the select disk page, it shows a error saying no drives found.I then performed a Hard Disk Test which resulted in failure saying:Failure ID : UC7WX0-5NB67S-XD6V5G-60TF03
Let me say first that I am not dual booting. I have a 250gb Internal SATA drive, and a 800gb internal SATA drive. Both hooked up and ready to go.What I want to do, and am unsure if it's possible, is to install Windows 7 64bit on the 250gb drive, and thats IT. I want to boot from that drive, but everything else I want to go onto the 800gb drive.I haven't done this yet but I get the feeling that if I were, when it boots from the 250, things that I download and install would always try and add themselves there. And I dread of having to manually move downloaded files and redirect installed programs every time.
My boyfriend reinstalled Windows 7 the other day to clear the crap from his system but unfortunately realised once he had done a quick format and reinstalled it that he had selected his back up drive and not the C drive. He then did it to the C drive but didn't uninstall it from the back up drive, and now it throws up a message saying the registration number has been used twice so is blocked but when he contacted Microsoft they said there is nothing they can do to unblock it. I don't believe buying a new version of Windows 7 is the only solution as it's a legal version bought from Amazon, has only been installed on his PC and surely as Adobe can deregister programs from their end it would be possible for Microsoft to do it. I know about the Adobe one as I have had to do it twice recently!
I have an Asus 1215n netbook. It came with Windows 7 Home Premium installed. The drive came with the following partitions:
100 GB Windows 7 15 GB Asus Expressgate (a quick-boot minimal OS) 118 GB Empty partition 15 MB (unknown)
I had been using TrueCrypt to encrypt the 100 GB system partition, which required that I enter a password before booting into windows.Other than that I never touched it until now. Today I decided to upgrade to Windows 7 Ultimate, so after making sure everything I wanted to keep was on the 118 GB partition, I booted into the Windows 7 setup, formatted *only the 100 GB partition* from within the setup, and selected it as the volume to which to install.Upon restarting, the third partition wasn't shown in My Computer. I went to Administrative Tools -> Computer Management -> Storage -> Disk Management, which shows the following partitions:
I've done these exact steps in the past with similar configurations, and have never had this happen to me before. I can only surmise that this is due to having had a TrueCrypt boot manager, but beyond that I am uncertain. how I might be able to recover this partition?
I have an HP Quad Core computer that came with two hard drives.I installed Windows 7 32 bit a year ago. The disk also came with a 64 bit version but the upgrade required a clean install.If I decide to install the 64 bit version, do I lose everything on both drives?
I'm having issues with transferring data between hard drives in my system. I have 3 500 GB drives in my system connected via esata. Just a few minutes ago I tried transferring 24.1 GB from one hard drive to another and it took forever I was getting under 10 MB per second. Once I got everything transferred I created a folder in the drive I moved everything to and then moved the same 24.1 GB plus another folder that was 10 GB and everything transferred into the folder instant, so fast I couldn't every look to see how long it was taking cause it was there the minutes I moved the folders to the new folder. Why did it take so long transferring that same data from one hard drive to another one in my system?? I should be getting a whole lot more than 10 MB per second.
I have two hard drives, one is SATA 500gb and the other is IDE 150gb. I had Windows 7 on the SATA and an old Ubuntu on the IDE hard drive. I hardly ever used Ubuntu and got tired of GRUB coming up every time I booted asking which OS I want so I decided to uninstall it. I wanted to go ahead and reformat the drive so I used an old Windows XP cd I have to reformat the 150g IDE drive. It wouldn't let me just reformat without installing XP so I went ahead and did that.So now whenever I turn on the PC it automatically boots into Windows XP. In XP I can see both drives, my 500gb with all my files and Windows 7 and the 150gb with just XP on it. In my BIOS the SATA 500gb is set as the main hdd, and is set as #1 in the boot priority (IDE hdd is not anywhere in boot priority). When I bring up the boot list and choose the SATA HDD it just brings up a BIOS flasher, no Windows 7.
I've had W7 on two computers that I built: My old one and my new one On the old comuter, W7 installed itself, boot loader and all, on a single partition. However, on my new build, W7 created a 100 mb "system reserved" partition leaving 111 G for data on one of my SSD's which I decided to use for other purposes ( W7 is installed on a second SSD which is partitioned as mentioned). Then, Using "disk management", I deleted the 100 mb partition on the SSD that I wish to use for other purposes, then tried to expand the 111 GB. I got some kind of useless message that said "object does not support this operation". So, the 100 mb "System Reserved" partition is not shown in "disk management" and is not available, nor can I restore it to use.
I have my HP Laptop which came with Windows Vista as the OS. I want to upgrade to Windows 7 so I bought Windows 7 from my local store.I entered the disc and did boot from CD. It reached to the page where it shows the disk partition. I deleted the partitions and created new one. However, whenever I create the partition, it creates a primary one and gives me error saying Setup was unable to create a new system partition or locate an existing system partition.
am trying to do a backup of my Win 7 system drive (C, but the backup utility is saying that it must backup by non-system drives (E: and H, which happen to have "System Volume Information" folders on them. They are not system drives. E: is my main utilities drive and H: is my games drive.Somehow, Windows thinks they are system drives, when in reality they aren't.Any ideas on how to change them? When I go in to Disk Management, they are not showing as system drives. They are all partitions on the same hard drive, but there are other partitions not included in the backup.
I have a copy of windows 7 from a friend. (USB, possibly enterprise)It runs well, is official and can be re installed and is verified through the Microsoft site, so the media doesn't seem to be a problem.I was able to install Win7 Ult x64 on my WinVista HomePrem x86, but I went back through to clean the hard drive (it was full, I didn't format before) and after low level formatting I cannot reinstall the OS. The harddrives are completely empty, and I get stuck at "Setup was unable to create a new system partition or locate an existing system partition," after hitting next when you are selecting the HD partition to install on. I tried a couple of things already:
-Installing on another harddrive -Formatting using Hiren's bootcd -Using a hard drive with XP installed to see if it is an upgrade and not a full version (no luck, still wouldn't install) -diskpart > list disk > select disk 0 > list partition > active \ in cmd..I have three hard drives attached to the computer right now, they can't all be broken. T.T
i have been trying to install a RAID array on my system, and due to some complications ended up having to reinstall windoiws from the master CD, now i noticve it has created a drive called "system reserved" - the volume is only 99.8 MB - when i open the drive it contains nothing at all? what is it / how do i get rid of it?
Recently my SSD failed so I tried installing windows 7 from DVD on my HDD but I always get an error message: "Setup was unable to create a new system partition or locate an existing system partition."I've tried everything I could find here: I gave boot priority to the HDD, I unplugged every other device but nothing seems to work.
make a dualboot comp by adding windows XP to a new partition. I created the new partition with 20gb. (From the 500 of my actual harddrive)But before I actually installed on that, I got distracted with a second harddrive that my dad got(for no reason). It had a full copy of Windows XP backed up on it from another computer, so I figured I would just use that for the dualboot. I plugged it in (wired the same way as my old harddrive, but different data slot), restarted, checked the harddrive in explorer - all the data was there / reading correctly / etc, and I used 'easyBCD' to add the new harddrive to the boot list.(Which, of course, crashes if I try to start it. I just wanted to see what it would do). For a reason I can't remember, I unplugged the second harddrive for a bit, started the computer on accident (I don't know if anything loaded before I shut it off), and then when I plugged it back in.Windows 7 would not launch. It goes to a DOS-like window, except it's just a flashing _ and it never does anything even after a few minutes. XP didn't work still.. so I decided to reinstall XP (as I couldn't tell which harddrive was which on the list, I unplugged the main harddrive while installing onto the new).. and when I did this.. it formatted and installed fully... then restarted.. then restarted.. and restarted.. and just kept restarting, never showing any thing past the manufacturer logo/BIOS load-button-message-thing. So, I then try to use my 3-disk Windows7Recovery disk(burned myself with a program apparently included by the manufacturer.) It installed fully, appearing to work.. but when I launched it, it said "Invalid Partition Table" and wouldn't boot past that. When I insert my driver installer disk, it gives me a basic DOS window thing. dir A: shows the files in the disk. dir B: for some reason shows the same. C: says "Error reading from drive C: DOS area: general failure". All other letter:'s just say "invalid drive". (I'm doing this with both harddrives in.) I attempted connecting the harddrives to an old computer, but it gave an error for both. (It detected the harddrives, but said it had an error reading from it. Windows Explorer asked me to format it... {i'm willing to format one of the drives if anybody thinks it will help, but the old harddrive has data I'd prefer not to lose.} ) Looking on google, I saw several problems that all have similar problems (less overdescripptive than I am though) but none of the fixes suggested worked for me. Also - as I have two different with different errors, I only need to make one of them work.)Also - my other available computer has a CD burner / floppy drive if either are required. I also have several USB's. The computer can boot from USB's and CD's (tested), and I could easily take the floppy thingy and connect it to the computer.also - this computer is probably still under warranty unless unscrewing the hard drive voids it. .. does that count as modification of the computer?
I currently have a dual boot on my computer with Windows 7 and XP. Unfortunately as my computer is quite old my hard drive is not very big and with it being partitioned I am fast running out of disk space. So I tried to shrink the XP partition to allow me more disk space for Windows 7. Unfortunatley this would only let me shrink it by 83mb for some reason. I decided that since I barely use XP anymore that I would simply reformat the XP drive then try and merge them together. When I tried to format the partition it just gave the error "Windows was unable to complete the format". I then discovered in Disk Management that the Windows XP partition was the system partition which was causing the problem.
I created a 20gb partition on my external hard drive and no longer require the partition. It is currently unallocated space so I want to format it into NFTS. Using computer management the partition was selected and and I went through the steps to format but i keep on getting an error message saying there is not enough space on the disk to complete this operation.
I have 5 hard drives in my system and I have installed windows 7 x64 on 2 separate drives and done this within windows. However a few times it booted okay but then started hanging on the post where it states verifying DMI pool data. Subsequently I tried everything to repair as I thought that the MBR was probably corrupted.
I have installed windows separately now on each drive by disconnecting all drives except the one that I am installing and then shut that down, disconnected it and connected the next and installed a fresh copy there to.
I am concerned that windows will corrupt the MBR again when I connect the drives one by one. I am not overly optimistic about windows boot manager and its reliability.
Ok I have Win XP on a ide drive (still use) I bought Windows 7 and installed on a seperate drive (sata) I also Have a 1TB Storage drive for media, files etc... (sata)
Now how do I do a dual boot with what operating system I want to start with Currently, I am disconnecting one of the drives from inside the case to use either Xp or 7.
As I know when using XP it says C Drive and the same for Windows 7 when Im using that...
Think it will crash or fail to install as they both say C Drive where the O.S. is.
Ok.I got it using Easy BCD..with no issues apart from a major one now!
I have 4 Sata connections on mobo 1-Data Drive for files / media (1TB) 2-Win 7 (320Gb) 3-DVDRW Drive 4-Blank on iDE cable - is Win XP
Now upon startup where it asks wither I want 7 or XP I can open/eject the drive but when either OS Starts and is ready to use ...my drive sticks ...cant open screen freezes!
Tried in 4th Sata connection and also other drive and same thing happens!
Through a series of shenanigans involving experiments with mirroring on Windows 7 64 bit using Disk Management, and then subsequently removing the mirror after having recurring errors/problems with the synching, My 100MB System Reserve partition has ended up on a separate partition than my system image. For instance: Disk 1 System C: Healthy (Boot, page...) Disk 0 Healthy (System Reserved...).
In addition, the System Reserved partition has been assigned a drive letter "G:" or "E:" and is now visible in explorer and it won't allow me to remove it and supress from explorer view.
I'd like to
1) move/create the System Reserve partition to Disk 1 (with System C: drive)
2) remove the System Reserve partition from Disk 0 to free it all up as a data drive
Do I use command below to create a System Reserve on Disk 1? bcdboot C:Windows How do I then delete the System Reserve partition on Disk 0. Also a byproduct of all of this, when I reboot now, I have a "Windows 7" option and a "Windows 7 Secondary Plex" option. The "Windows 7" option no longer boots (it's stops while the logo panes are flying in circles to form the logo and goes into a fix loop that never fixes it). I have a feeling it's looking for the old mirrored hardware configuration or something. However, "Window 7 Secondary Plex" option does boot just fine. Do I use MSCONFIG to remove the "Windows 7" boot entry so I don't get this annoying option at boot?
ack when I first set up my system I used a tutorial on this forum that showed how to install the OS on one drive and everything else on the other. The setup required changing the registry settings in audit mode during the initial OS install. I am looking for this tutorial but now can't find it. I even posted in this post, but even those are missing so I can't just trace my posts. I'm confused as to why it is missing and am hoping anybody could lead me back to it.
Suddenly my Win 7 Home Premium x64 will not boot. The system starts, POSTs then loads the DVD driver, then the screen goes black (not blank but "lit up" black if that makes sense). Then nothing. If I use Hiren's boot cd I can boot up using the "boot from HDD" option fine and Windows operates normally. System restore to a previous configuration made no difference to the original problem. I cannot boot into Safe Mode. F8 just offers me boot order options.
- Running the Windows 7 DVD I find: "No operating system is listed on the Repair Windows option." - Running Startup Repair finds the following error: "the partition table does not have a valid system partition" which it claims to have repaired, but the error remains and Windows will still not boot.
I followed this advice: Boot 7 dvd to system recovery options command prompt. Type: Diskpart list vol (find the vol letter e.g C or partition number e.g. 1 for the system partition ) Sel vol C ( or sel vol 1, obviously use the correct letter or number) act exi
My system partition was easily identified and listed as healthy so I selected it and made it active. The problem still remains exactly the same. My system is self built just over a year ago, to my knowledge has been running fine, without any hardware issues. I'm prepared to do a clean install if that's what it takes but if there is a way to fix the partition problem without that I'd like to explore it first.
I just installed Windows 7 build 7068. 64bit.I have an Asus P5WD2E-Premium mobo, and 5 Western Digital Hard drives of various sizes, all SATA.Windows recognizes only 2 of the drives, the c drive of course, and only 1 of two WD 400gig hds, which are identical.I know this may be a mobo issue, but, wasn't sure about Windows 7.
Recently, my ancient desktop died on me. I had some stuff stored on the main C drive (40 GB) and some on an external 1 TB drive. I put the 40 GB HD in the external module to upload it to a laptop with a 360 GB HD. I would then like to transfer that 40 GB to the 1 TB drive. When I plug in the external with the 40 GB, it appears that the Windows 7 machine does not read it or pick it up. It recognizes it as an external device, but not as a drive.