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Boot manager for multi-boot


0sync0

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Years ago I used a program called BootMagic for muti-booting. It could activate and deactivate partitions so each installation of an OS was completely isolated from other installations. It worked pretty well but the MBR would occasionally get corrupted. Restoring images was also a nuisance but I don't why.

Boot managers don't seem to be as popular these days. Is anyone using one that you recommend?

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Bootmagic changed the MBR of the hard drive, and the PBR of the partition that it was installed on. The excellent free XOSL works in the same way and was far superior to BootMagic. There is however a small issue with it and Vista if they are both on the same drive. It changes the Disk Signature in the MBR and so causes Vista boot problems. www2.arnes.si/%7Efkomar/xosl.org

I would recommend a boot manager that resides entirely in the MBR and does not touch any partitions. These three all work fine with Vista.

www.osloader.com

http://gag.sourceforge.net

www.boot-us.com

The first one is my personal favourite because it builds the boot menu for you on every boot – not free however.

EDIT: I can't get links to work in this post and the GAG link always gets a comma added to disable it. Remove the comma from the end of the link in your browser.

Edited by McTavish
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OSL2000 sounds really interesting. I download and installed it but I can't get it to run from a Vista command prompt. All I get is the help screen. When I reboot I get the interface but after selecting an OS I then also get the Vista boot loader.

It hid the other primary partitions which is good. But it thinks there is an OS installed on one of my USB hard drives. It found an MBR on there for some reason. So it hid that partition which I don't want.

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I can't get it to run from a Vista command prompt

Sorry, but why do you want to?

I then also get the Vista boot loader

Were you using the Vista bootmanager before? Any third party bootmanager will not replace the Vista one. If you already allowed the installation of the Vista bootmanager it will mean that one or more of your OSes do not have their own boot files on their own partition and so you will have to continue to use the Vista bootmanager to be able to boot them. You will need to remove the Vista bootmanager yourself, but of course make all you OSes independently bootable before you do so. It kinds of defeats the purpose of using a third party bootmanager if your OSes have already been linked together by the Windows one.

It hid the other primary partitions which is good. But it thinks there is an OS installed on one of my USB hard drives. It found an MBR on there for some reason. So it hid that partition which I don't want.

All it's seeing is the partition table in the MBR, it does not mean that there is any bootcode in there. By default it lists all formatted partitions, if they are not bootable you can remove them from the boot menu with F5.

I've used OSL for so long - several years - that I have just got used to its partition hiding options and I configure the system to work with them. I forgot that if you have a data partition that is on a primary partition it could be a problem. When you set partition hiding in OSL it will mean all primary partitions but the one you are booting into will be hidden. There are two ways round it, you can turn off partition hiding and then use Disk Management in each NT OS to remove the drive letters from just the partitions you don't want to see. Or the other way is to make your data partitions logical ones. Personally I do this from the outset, but it is possible to convert them later if you have a trustworthy partitioning tool. I'm not a fan of such operations and consider them risky, so I can't recommend conversion.

The free Gag has the same partition hiding options as OSL, but both XOSL and Boot-us have options to hide only the partitions you want.

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I can't get it to run from a Vista command prompt

Sorry, but why do you want to?

So I can configure OSL without rebooting. It is not a big deal though.

I forgot that if you have a data partition that is on a primary partition it could be a problem. When you set partition hiding in OSL it will mean all primary partitions but the one you are booting into will be hidden.

I have two USB hard drives and both are formatted as primary partitions. OSL only found an MBR on one of them and that is the only one it hid.

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Were you using the Vista bootmanager before? Any third party bootmanager will not replace the Vista one. If you already allowed the installation of the Vista bootmanager it will mean that one or more of your OSes do not have their own boot files on their own partition and so you will have to continue to use the Vista bootmanager to be able to boot them. You will need to remove the Vista bootmanager yourself, but of course make all you OSes independently bootable before you do so. It kinds of defeats the purpose of using a third party bootmanager if your OSes have already been linked together by the Windows one.

I was using the Vista boot manager before. I thought OSL would remove it. How do I get rid of it?

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Getting rid of the Vista bootmanager could be tricky depending on your setup. You would need to post me a screenshot of your drives in Disk Management. This page should explain to you the possible problems. www.multibooters.co.uk/multiboot.html

Don't know why OSL only seen one USB drive. I've never had 2 connected.

Most of OSL's configuration can be done from the bootmenu screen. Once set you should never need to adjust it. You can do some things from inside Windows, but I've only ever played with these options, a long time ago. You'll need to read the manual I'm afraid.

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Getting rid of the Vista bootmanager could be tricky depending on your setup. You would need to post me a screenshot of your drives in Disk Management. This page should explain to you the possible problems. www.multibooters.co.uk/multiboot.html

That's a very helpful link. I haven't tried booting any of the non-Vista partitions since installing OSL. But it looks like I shouldn't have a problem with them since making them active will bypass the Vista boot manager. Then removing the non-Vista entries in the BCD should take care of the Vista boot manager coming up when I boot Vista.

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You haven't grasped it yet 0sync0. Only one of your Windows installs will have their own boot files on their own partition. Trying to directly boot any of the others won't work. If you had XP installed before Vista, then your Vista boot files are inside XP.

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I understand that. Fixing it in XP is simple and I've already done that. I don't know what is involved in fixing it in my second Vista installation. But I can fix it by making that partition active and then reinstalling.

This point brings up what I consider to be bad advice in the OSL docs. They recommend installing all OS's and then install OSL. This leaves out that you should make the partition active before installing the OS.

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I'll mention this in case anyone knows a solution. When I run OSL from a Vista command window I get this message:

Application popup: 16 bit Windows Subsystem : An application has attempted to directly access the hard disk, which cannot be supported. This may cause the application to function incorrectly. Choose 'Close' to terminate the application.
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Your denial of access to the hard disk in Vista I would guess is because of access restrictions. Try opening the command prompt as Administrator, (right click on the CP shortcut and choose that option). If that does not work then turn off UAC.

Just looked at the OSL docs and it does say to make the partitions Active.

If you are happy reinstalling Vista in the correct manner then that should fix things for you. You will of course have to reinstall OSL afterwards as Vista will overwrite it. Make sure you can install OSL from floppy or CD, just in case you can't get to the desktop. It should be possible to fix your current install, but you would need to get it correct. I would have to know your exact setup to help.

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Your denial of access to the hard disk in Vista I would guess is because of access restrictions. Try opening the command prompt as Administrator, (right click on the CP shortcut and choose that option). If that does not work then turn off UAC.

I am Admin in Vista. I was running it from the command console which shows that I am Admin. I just tried creating a shortcut but the option to run as Admin is greyed out.

I always work with UAC turned off.

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If you are happy reinstalling Vista in the correct manner then that should fix things for you. You will of course have to reinstall OSL afterwards as Vista will overwrite it. Make sure you can install OSL from floppy or CD, just in case you can't get to the desktop. It should be possible to fix your current install, but you would need to get it correct. I would have to know your exact setup to help.

I have attached an image from Disk Management. The installation that needs boot files is the second partition on Disk 0.

I forgot that the external drive that OSL is hiding is marked Active. That is probably what is causing OSL to hide it.

post-159360-1193437229_thumb.jpg

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