Crashed Multi-Boot-System

If you had Linux installed on your system, you could use lilo "the boot manager of linux". You just specify which partition on which disk it should boot and it does.

Do you have a ERD (emergency repair disk) from your NT setup? If you do, start the installation of NT. It will ask you to do a "repair" or new install. Choose repair and you will be asked for your ERD. Should be that simple. On the other hand, if you don't have one, you will probably have to re-install NT. You have multiple NT setup so you won't have to re-install all but one will have to be done. That one setup will find the other NTs for you and set up multiple boot for 98 and other NTs. Actually if you have a little extra space on the disk, you can set up another partition and install NT there. This will get the multiple boot back for you and then you could destroy the partition after...

you should install win98 first , then reinstall NT back over itself , if you install nt first or repair it then you install win98 its going to knock out multiboot again  
that way nt will reconize the other os's

Provided you have the c: drive containing win 98 and the NT drive can be seen by NT setup you can select using NTsetup to do a repair on a system without the ERD.

You will be given a list of boxes to which you select the system file option.

On reboot when NT wants to quickly autostart the continued setup force the boot menu to run win 98.
( you have to be quick!!)

What has happened at this point is that the NTsetup has recreated the NTboot system.

In win98, edit the Boot.ini to exclude the setup and enter the information for your NT systems.

Delete any NT temp directories.

Netmage

>"Delete any NT temp directories."
That should read Delete any NT temp setup directories.

 

Ziab, since I do not knowing what you've got to work with, here's another idea.

You will need these files:

· NTLDR
· NTDETECT.COM
· BOOT.INI
· BOOTSEC.DOS (If you dual boot with DOS or Windows 9X)
· NTBOOTDD.SYS if you have SCSI disks and no SCSI BIOS in operation (you may not need it even then.)

If you don't have them available, there are some alternatives to consider besides trashing your NT installations.

MAKE NT BOOTABLE

Once Windows 98 is installed, reboot your computer with the Windows 98 floppy, launch Fdisk, and press 2, then 1 to make the NTFS drive the active (bootable) partition.

Next, answer the remaining prompts, remove the Windows 98 boot floppy, and then reboot. The computer should now boot to Windows NT.

Now create the ERD disk as well as the 3 install disks if you don't have them.

Reverse the above process and recreate your bootloader.

Keep in mind though that if that Win98 partition is fat 32, you can't use the NTLDR, you'll need a partition boot manager, however you can find Boot Partition 2.2 here and its free.

http://www.pcworld.com/fileworld/file_description/0,1458,6461,00.html

Dennis

Thanks a lot for all those hints!
netmages ideas did the job (almost) - after starting an installation of NT on a free partition, I regained a boot.ini and was consequently able to recover NTWorkstation and NTServer by editing boot.ini.

But I got one further problem: I've alos installed a ReleaseCandidateVersion of Win2000 and this one, I did not get back so far. I tried nearly every partition number (btw: I have only logical partitions), I tried also, to install another Win2000 - it was not able to detect the first aon (expect in console repairModus)

What do you think: Is it dangerous to set the partition with Win2000, which is a Primary one as the active one: Is there a danegr, that I won't be able to boot at all after that?

Or in the consoleVerison there is alos a possibility to do something with the partitions, but I#m not sure, what will happen than.

I will give the popints to netmages, because that helped most oft the way, but perhaps I would split them (or give some extra points opr something like that), if I will be able to manage this problem.

Thanks anyway ziab

ziab, in your array of partitions, on which one did you put Win2000?
Dennis

I got Win98 on C
NTWorkstation on D
NTServer on E
and Win2000 is on H
CDRom is G

Win98 has problems with these drives: it sees the Win2000 partition on I, the CDRom on H and gives a G partition, which is not accessible.

I installed a new Win2000 on F, which works fine, but I would like to regain the one on H.

I tried around with the partition number in boot.ini up to 6 or 7 and there was always the message, that the partition is not bootable.

ziab

If you boot into Fdisk and check the old Win2000 partition, are you able to make it bootable just to see if you can run a repair?

Hy and sorry for my delay, I am a little ill.

I see the partition in WinNT as a primary partition, but I didn't dare to make it the active one. Could I try this and be sure that my computer will be still bootable?

I do not really know FDisk exactly: I would need to boot in DosMode and then do what with FDisk?

I was able to enter something that was called Console-Win2000-RepairModus while installing the new Win2000 and then I was even asked the password for the Win2000 - so I think it's still 'alive'.

ziab

Fdisk will allow you to move through the partitions and make whatever you choose active and try and boot to it. You can't do this with Win9X, but you can with NT. Once you can determine if the files are intact and do a repair, you can go back to Fdisk and re-enable another partition. You can do this with your Windows 98 boot disk.

Boot to the floppy and then run Fdisk. Choose to view the partitions and from there you can choose which should be the active partition. Remember though, NT doesn't use dos boot files like dos or Win9X, so if the NT boot files are corrupt, you will need to recreate them.

Using NT's "Disk Administrator", is this partition seen?
Is this partition "primary" or "extended"?

Due to differences with NT4 and win2000 files systems, what tool did you use to create the partitions?

I used FDisk and made the strange partition G active: I moved NTLDR etc. to it, but even though the computer was not able to start.

NTDiskManager and FDisk both are seeing the partition (one giving it the name I, the other one G), FDisk is able like NTDiskManger to set it Active, but in DosMode the drive is not accessible.
If I type G: I get an error 'Unknown Format' or something like that.

I used DOS top make the partitions before I started up the MultiBoot in the beginning. DOS had a problem, that it could not partition more than 8 GB or something like that.
There remained an unpartitioned space, which I partitioned later on with WIN NT (perhaps 2000, I am not sure).
I did not use NTFS, but even though - I think because of the size - Win98 does not work with this partition.

What's your opininon: Is there any other way? Are you knowing something about this Repair-Console-Mode in Win2000 where the lost System was seen and where even the password  was asked?

ziab

You can't see that partition from Dos once NT (any version) is loaded to that partition unless it is strictly FAT16 and less then 8.4G for Win98 or 4.0G for NT. The only thing I can suggest without actually sitting at the machine is that you make the Win98 partition bootable and recreate your NT loader and point it to that partition. This would be the way to go about it.

I do not really understand, what you mean with 'point your NTLoader to that partition.'

Win98 partition is now (with your help) active and bootable; I edited boot.ini to point to nearly every partition-number (4,5,6...)without success concerning the Win2000 partition.
FDisk sets the message, that the FileType on the partition is unknown - probably because it's bigger than 8.4 GB.

Is there another possibility to point to this partition?

Otherwise do you aggree, that I should perhaps accept, that the Win2000 installation is lost? (Would not be that bad, I'll just have to reinstall VB, some email-settings, MSDE - of course I wanted to understand the problems.)

Thanks ziab

Unfortunately you may be right. If you can't get into that partition and you don't have the repairs disks to re-access it, you're in a bind that I don't think I can get you out of.

>I did not use NTFS, but even though - I think because of the size - Win98 does not work with this partition.

Its possible that you formatted this partition as DOS. NT only knows about FAT16 size and FAT64  to enable you to get a larger DOS partition that NT can use. Win98 won't see this.

Fat64 can be a terrible waste of space due to the way a 2k file can occupy a 64k space on disk.


What NT service pak are you using?

Greater than service pak 4 was needed to enable NT to be compatible with the win2k NTFS. As you don't have NTFS this shouldn't be a problem but the nt boot system also had an update at this time that may affect.

>What's your opininon: Is there any other way? Are you knowing something about this Repair-Console-Mode in Win2000 where the lost System was seen and where even the password  was asked?

Regarding win2k,only use release candidate 2 or 3 and try to reinstall.
RC1 won't be updateable and other problems.
 
If NT can see the partition then win2ksetup should be able to rebuild. Choose options to not overwrite your system settings.

The eventual outcome will be that the win2k bootloader that adds the new partition info to the boot ini.

Netmage, given all that has been posted here, re-read your last post. Does it make sense somehow to you?
Dennis

Not really , dennis.
You have a point.

Just reviewing eveything again, i think i've lost count of whats where here.

>I installed a new Win2000 on F, which works fine, but I would like to regain the one on H.


Ok, now so i can keep count.

1 win98
1 NT
1 new working win2k
1 not working win2k


Total = 4

Os partition limitation of DOS Fdisk = 1 primary + extended.
Os partition limitation of NT Disk admin = 3 primary + extended or 4 primary.
Os partiton limitation of win2k = I don't know yet.

So 4 would be it i hope.
But H?

Alphabetically "H" may be a problem as it means its on an extended partition.

i've never seen NT or win2k installed at this level before.

Ok, now reading further into comments and using win2k (as was used perhaps originally)  then by loading "computer management" and selecting "disk management" ( its still disk administrator on early beta)if you can see the partiton, then you have the option to make it active.

If this is not possible and you can't view it properties then thats the end of the story and you would be best deleteing the partiton and recreate it.

If you have vital information then there are disk tools to be bought that have a fair chance or file recovery.

netmage changed the proposed answer to a comment

Love that new button:-)

according to his earlier post, he has 6 partitions, and has been trying to make G active. Frankly now that we have everything back except that single lost partition, I'd leave things alone and just try and see what that partition actually is. If its Fat16 or 32, Win98 will see it. If its Fat 16 or NTFS (NT4 or NT2K) either NT will see it. If its damaged, which it may be, then none of the OS's will see it and it will need to be dealt with within the OS of choice.

It's a little tricky with this partition:
In WinNT it's called H and is seen, primary (but does not boot, when active, even not, if I copy those NTLDR etc. Files!).
In Win98 it's called G and I - where I is FAT and normally accessible (but not bootable) and G is corrupted at all; G isn't accessible, properties shows 0 MB, but when I initialize formating G Win98 shows 1700 MB.
To add something stupid: In Win98 CD Rom is H and is shown in MYComputer between D and E. I Think, Win98 does not like Win2kdisarrange his matters (nor does Win2K like to get formatted his boot partition).

I aggree: Let's skip it, I'll save some files and settings, format the irregular Drive and use the new Win2000.

I would like to give both of you half of the points; so I would have to delete this question with all those infos, to get the points back.
What do you think?

ziab

I see, that's the right way to split up points.

Thanks again to both of you!

ziab

Anytime my friend!