XP Dual Boot

[jclu52]

I've 2 HDD with XP Pro installed in primary (1st) partition on both drive.
Recently, I've used PartitionMagic (by PowerQuest) to copy (overwrites) 1st XP to 2nd drive.

Right after the completion, it reboots and I happily choose the newly copied XP Pro. Well, PartitionMagic starts doing the COPY partition again. Did not realize what went on, after rebooting, I choosed the 2nd XP Pro (as done previously). The video card's driver starts acting strangely.

So I reboot and choose my 1st partition. It acted strangely. It was as if the 1st partition does not exist. It was desiginated as "multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)" in Boot.ini. The next reboot, I choosed "multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)" - before copying over, I imaged 2nd drive's XP Pro to multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2).

Choosing multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2) works as if I've choosed multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1).

I've used DiskAdmin and PartitionMagic, SET command to verify that I am actually booting from multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1) (1st partition) not 2nd.

VERY STRANGE behavior.

I then copy the partition again using Drive Image (also by PowerQuest). I got the same result. Now, my system works only if I choose multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2) but not multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1).

My copied XP no longer works. I've done it before but this time, I am toally lost.

Have anyone seen this?
Is it related with MBR being messed up?
How to resolve it besides reformat / reinstall?

Thanks for your help.

[jclu52]

While working to find a solution to fix my problem - I found MBRWiz.
It's a command line tool. The /list switch shows the partition on the disk.

Here is my HD0's list:

	 Disk: 0   Size=191G
	 Pos MBRndx Type/Name  Size Active Hide Start Sector   Sectors
	 --- ------ ---------- ---- ------ ---- ------------ ------------
	  0    1    07-NTFS     23G   Yes   No            63   46,138,617
	  1    0    17-NTFS     23G   No    Yes   46,138,680   46,138,680
	  2    3    0F-EXTEND  146G   No    No    92,277,360  298,439,505

The 2nd column, MBRndx, has the 1st partition set as partition(1), while the 2nd partition is partition(0).
That seems to be concide to what I have been encountered.

It has a /SORT switch. I applied the switch and the list becomes:

	 Disk: 0   Size=191G
	 Pos MBRndx Type/Name  Size Active Hide Start Sector   Sectors
	 --- ------ ---------- ---- ------ ---- ------------ ------------
	  0    0    07-NTFS     23G   Yes   No            63   46,138,617
	  1    1    17-NTFS     23G   No    Yes   46,138,680   46,138,680
	  2    2    0F-EXTEND  146G   No    No    92,277,360  298,439,505

I have not have a chance to reboot. But I think this is the problem. I will follow up with result if this is a fix.

As always, BACK UP your system before attempting working with MBR or Partition software.

You can locate MBRWizard at http://www.geocities.com/mbrwizard/

[jclu52]

I can now report that everything is back to normal.

Here is what MBRWizard said about NT/W2K/XP and drive restored using Drive Image/Ghost or the like.

"/Sort - It isn’t uncommon for the partition entries in the MBR to be unsorted after reinstalling Windows or restoring a Ghost image. This means that the partition order in the MBR won't match the order on disk. Normally this wasn’t a problem until Windows NT/2K/XP came along with its new boot loader, and the requirement that each partition entry in the boot.ini must point to the actual partition number. This option will sort the entries in the MBR to match their physical order on disk." - quoted from http://www.geocities.com/mbrwizard/r...ce.html?200624