Hard drive question

[ibamars]

I'm not sure how to approach this and am looking for help. I have a Dell. The computer came with one HDD. I just installed another internal HDD. The HDD that came with the computer was preinstalled with Windows 64bit. I received a CD from Dell after complaining about not having a bootable cd and they sent me one.

So being bored I decided to install a second internal HDD. I installed the operating system which is Windows 32bit. (they sent me the wrong one!! jerks).

My question is this. When I boot the computer I don't want to have to access the bios everytime to pick a HDD to boot from. Is there a program or bios tweak (which my bios is very limited) for when i hit the power button on my computer and it starts booting, that it will give me an option to pick a HDD?

Remember this is not a dual boot system. It is 2 separate HDD each with its own O/S.

Anyone that can help thanks!!

Scott

 

[NickCat11]

If both drives are bootable you should just be able to go into the Bios and select which drive you would like the computer to boot from first. For example if you have 2 drives (a and b), move drive "a" to the top of the list on the boot priority and it should automatically boot from that one without any user input.

 

[angry_geek]

PLEASE do not take this the wrong way, but this is extremely basic stuff. I read through your posts, and I'm wondering what kind of work you are doing. I think your best bet at this point is to get some experience in a shop or maybe with some college courses.

To answer your question (please don't flame me guys for answering his question), go into your bios, navigate to the boot page, select which hdd you want to boot first. This will change the boot order to whatever you specify.

 

[ibamars]

Guys like I said. I know how to go into the bios and pick which HDD to boot from. My question is is there a way for the computer to automatically display and give you an option of which hard drive you want boot from WITHOUT having to go into the bios everytime?

 

[angry_geek]

F12 or install a boot loader like grub or something

 

[MrUnknown]

EasyBCD should allow you to boot the other OS from the boot menu.

 

[anonymous Mac Tech]

Get a Mac, then you can hold down the option key at start-up to access the boot manager or "boot picker". Or when booted to either drive in system preferences/startup disk you can set your preferential selection there.

 

[LunchBox]

You have 2 options

Option 1 = Press F12 as suggestion and choose your drive (the easiest)
Option 2 = Get 2 hard drive caddies, install the HDs into them, run the caddy with the OS you want to run.

 

[@ncient geek]

Just edit the boot.ini

multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINNT="Windows 32bit" /fastdetect
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINNT="Windows 64bit" /fastdetect

you will have to edit this example to suit your needs

 

[ibamars]

Thanx for all the replies so far. I am going to try them out today. I reread my post and forgot say that the O/S are Vista not XP. @ncient geek, I don;t think Vista has the boot.ini file in vista. Doesn't Vista use the BCD option in Vista?

Thanx again, any other answers welcome so far and I will update when I have it figured out.

Scott

 

[NickCat11]

http://www.computerweekly.com/Articles/2007/04/04/222876/boot.ini-is-gone-bcd-is-here.htm

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc721886(WS.10).aspx

 

[rusty.nells]

You might try EasyBCD.