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2 OS'2 on my computer...what the heck??

post #1 of 6
7/18/06 at 8:25am
Thread Starter 
Hi,

I have tried to reinstall windows on my Dell 1505 with the reinstall windows CD that i got for the computer (after phoning Dell). On the CD it says XP with Media Center but during one install the computer crashed and i had to start again. The second time all was fine and windows restarted. However, when i start windows i have to choose which OS to use the Media center one which works fine or the XP Pro one (when the computer crashed during install). How can i get rid of this non working XP Pro? I want it so that when i start up it goes straight to windows without asking which one i want to use....

Any ideas......?

Thanks.
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post #2 of 6
7/18/06 at 9:01am
Yep, it's in the FAQ actually:

Quote:
Originally Posted by DELL FAQ
4.(iv) I've formatted and upon boot there is now two Windows options showing, what do I do?

This is actually quite common, and first thing is first I want to assure you that the original install that you formatted is actually gone, that partition is erased and there is no reason to start over with another format yet again. This happens as a result of a 'leftover' sometimes present in the boot.ini file of windows after a fresh install. You will find that if you try and select both, one will actually load your new windows and the other will present an error (becuase it is a leftover that leads to nothing). Therefore it is safe to remove this leftover reference so that it no longer appears at boot and you load straight into Windows.

To eliminate this load screen there are two options, the easy and 'forget about it' option is to simply disable the load screen. To do this:

(i) Right click on My Computer on the desktop and select Properties;
(ii) Go to the Advanced tab and click Settings under the 'Startup and Recovery' box;
(iii) Untick the box that says 'Time to display list of Operating Systems'. Hey presto, the problem is gone .

Alternatively, we can go a little further and edit the boot.ini file, which removes the invalid Windows entry. First thing is first, boot up the laptop and find out which reference works and which doesn't, usually the bottom one is false. With this information we now get into it. Once on the Windows desktop:

(i) Right click on My Computer on the desktop and select Properties;
(ii) Go to the Advanced tab and click Settings under the 'Startup and Recovery' box;
(iii) Click the Edit button seen in the 'System startup' box, you will be presented with a notepad entry such as the following

Quote:
[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition" /fastdetect
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional Edition" /fastdetect

Note that it may vary from this slightly, depending upon what two OS you had installed, etc.
(iv) Delete the entire line of the appropriate OS you want to remove from the boot list. For example above I have bolded the second whole entry as false above, when the bottom selection was false. Delete the top line if the opposite is true;
(v) You are done, Save the changes and exit all of this. Upon next boot you will go straight into your new Windows install, enjoy!

Stu
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post #3 of 6
7/18/06 at 9:02am
From within windows do the following:

Click start, then click run

Type msconfig

Hit enter

Highlight the Boot.ini tab

Click the Check all boot paths button

It will detect and give you a message saying it found and invalid boot path and do you want to remove the entry. Click yes

Restart and your good.
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post #4 of 6
7/18/06 at 9:03am
The option to disable the startup screen is messy and doesnt solve the problem, do what I said to remove the entry in the boot.ini file and its cleaner and works.
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post #5 of 6
7/18/06 at 2:15pm
Thread Starter 
Cosmico!!! It works and now i only have the one Media Adition. Thanks for your help, i was up until 5am (ish) trying to reinstall all this stuff and it was killing me....

Thanks again all..
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post #6 of 6
7/19/06 at 12:43am
thanks bud i was having the same problem. wow its been years since i messed with msconfig. with so many programs making life easier....
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