Guide Moving Vista Boot Manager (BCD)

The Scenario:
While performing a fresh Vista install with more than one HDD's installed, the Vista boot manager (BCD) at times get installed on a different drive than the drive you chose to the install the OS onto.

If you don't know on which drive is the boot manager installed, open Command Prompt, type in bcdedit, Notice the second line "partition=X:" under both the heads.
Partition=C: under Windows Boot Manager means that it is located in Drive C and the same under Windows Vista Bootloader corresponds to your OS installation.

If they are same then your boot manager(BCD) is in the same partition as your OS, you're good to go. If they are different then keep reading.

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This solution provided herein can also be applied in the condition where the installed OS and the BCD is located at different partitions instead of different drives.
The Reason:
This may happen due a set HDD priority in bios or sumthing else.
Why is this a problem?:
This is a problem because, say you have 2 HDD's i.e C: & D: and Vista is installed on C, whereas vista's boot manager is installed on D.
Now for whatever reasons you need to take out D:, but since the boot manager is installed on D, taking it out would render your machine unbootable.

Now removing the Drive D: and then using vista installation disc's repair menu doesn't help cuz it doesn't detect the installed OS.
The Solution:

Download VistaBootPro from HERE (Bottom of the page)

Step I.
Start the Application. It'll redirect you to the BCD backup page. Click on browse the save a backup copy at say C:\Backup.

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Step II.
Goto the root directory of the drive where the BCD is installed say Drive D:.

Tools->Folder Options-> View -> Select show hidden files & Uncheck hide protected OS files

Copy
i. bootmgr
ii. grldr
iii. BOOT (folder)

Paste the same into the root directory of the drive where Vista is installed say Drive C:.
It will give an error copying 2 file's i.e BCD and BCD.log, saying they are currently being used by someother application. Skip these files

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Step III.
Goto the folder C:\Backup where we backed up the BCD earlier in step I.
Rename the files like this (make another backup first).

xxx.bcd -> BCD
xxx.bcd.log -> BCD.LOG
xxx.bcd.log1 -> BCD.LOG1
xxx.bcd.log2 -> BCD.LOG2

Copy all these files and paste them into the C:\Boot folder, replacing all files.
Step IV.
Reboot.
Open Bios.
Change HDD Priority from Drive D: to Drive C:.
Boot to Vista Installation Disc.
Select repair my computer and proceed further.
Congratulations You're BCD and OS are in the same Drive now.
 
Click to expand...
Many thanks. It worked well. However, before running the Vista repair I had to switch the SATA cables on my two drives so that the "real" boot drive was inline before the other drive. Otherwise the repair failed. Cheers!
 
good work man.. repped..
if possible try mentioning the consequences of doing this if its done improperly.. cuz i ve tried this once and it rendered my hdd unbootable.. had to wipe out my hard drive
 
Even if one screws up, the original files aren't being moved, just copied.
So in case something goes wrong just select your original drive/partition as primary boot device and it should boot-up normally.

@osolobo - Did you change the disk priority in bios bfore the repair?
 
Does this work for this scenerio: I am using vista boot pro make the nogui boot exists on my bcd for a unattended dvd so my boot screen shows up when the machine is boot and I want to move my boot store to a usb stick then back to my ISO, would this work? :clap: :hap2: :) :huh: John
 
Didn't work for me. I followed it to the letter, twice and still need to attach my D drive to get the system to boot up. I saw that the Vista Repair updated the bootmanager at the end of the process, and if I run the repair again it reports no errors present in the boot up process with only my C drive plugged in. But it just will not boot from the C drive without the D drive functioning.
 
Thank you so much, I've been looking desperately for a solution to this problem!
I only have one question - after I did all as described, and the BCD and OS are in the same drive (C), there are still boot files and directories in drive D, but it's not in use - so I can delete it. Can you reply with the instructions for what is safe to delete? I don't want to make a mess...
 
To be sure, disconnect the other HDD from your mobo and see if the OS boots fine with just C drive attached.

If it does, feel free to delete the files on the other drive.
 
The boot is now definitely from drive C.
But I don't know which files and directories from D I can delete.
Should I delete ALL the hidden files and directories in this drive? (It suppose to contain only music, videos and other stuff like this)
Is there a list of files somewhere?
 
Yea you can wipe out all the files in D except the "system volume information folder.

Also if there is a pagefile.sys, you wont be able to delete it.
 
thanks for the guide man,

I tried following the steps, but my case doesn't exactly match the one you described

I have the BCD on another partition on the same disk, so I can't disable it in order to boot from the vista dvd

I did all the steps up to the 4th, and I see there is no change after I run BCDedit... the bootmanager still shows up on partition S:

Do you have any idea how I could fix this?

I'm trying to get rid of the restore partition because it takes some 7GB and I need them.

Thanks in advance,

Alex
 
AlexRmF said:
thanks for the guide man,

I tried following the steps, but my case doesn't exactly match the one you described

I have the BCD on another partition on the same disk, so I can't disable it in order to boot from the vista dvd

I did all the steps up to the 4th, and I see there is no change after I run BCDedit... the bootmanager still shows up on partition S:

Do you have any idea how I could fix this?

I'm trying to get rid of the restore partition because it takes some 7GB and I need them.

Thanks in advance,

Alex
Click to expand...

Hi alex, I'm a bit busy to explain in layman's term.

Refer to this - http://neosmart.net/forums/showthread.php?t=2568

best of luck :)
 
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