16 replies to this topic

[saynowt]

ok i have re installed windows onto my hard drive i used a quick format option all has gone well apart from one thing when the machine boots it gives me a choice of two operating systems to choose from .If i choose the first one everything is ok when i choose the second one i get installation not found can anyone tell me how to get rid of the second installation optin

xp professional
dell dimentions 9100

thanks for any help

[todd1970]

Goto Start>Control Panel>System>top tab >advanced then chose 'startup and recovery options'.

At the top you will see 'Default operating system' and a pull down bar to XP or Vista for example.

The box that is ticked 'time to display list of operating systems' its set for 30 seconds..untick that box after choosing the OS you want it to boot into..then apply and ok it.

You need to make sure this is done correctly or the machine wont boot..restart the PC et voila.

This is going by memory only as its a while since i used XP.

Hope this helps.

[Matty.N]

todds right

or just left click my computer advanced & then select start up & recovery from there

what ever you do dont delete a thing as i deleted the oldOS entry & it screwed the entire boot log for both vista & xp, despite vista being a totally different boot long o.0

[saynowt]

thank you todd and matty it worked a treat got a super fast pc again, still dunno why it came up with two boot systems after a format lol.I only need to get my second hard disk to work now then im sorted, once again thanks to both of you's

[todd1970]

dunno why it came up with two boot systems after a format

I know..mines does that as well..i installed Windows7 32bit and it installed just fine..then realised i should have been using Windows7 64bit..so it was a format C drive blah blah blah..and it was giving me the option of Windows7 or Earlier version of Windows.

There must be a reason it does this..although why i have no idea..anyways glad you got your PC sorted.

[Matty.N]

you know how a 200gb hdd shows up as about 190gig?

the remaining space is reserved for system files that are important

that includes the MBR (master boot record) i believe (or something along those lines)

[todd1970]

you know how a 200gb hdd shows up as about 190gig?

the remaining space is reserved for system files that are important

that includes the MBR (master boot record) i believe (or something along those lines)

Spose the only way round that then would be to do a proper 'fdisk'..like in the olden days to get your HD totally wiped of all data.

[Matty.N]

Spose the only way round that then would be to do a proper 'fdisk'..like in the olden days to get your HD totally wiped of all data.

except it doesnt really work well in vista

well not with fat32 anyways >.>

why must sony use fat32 in their ps3

[saynowt]

im trying to install a second hard drive what a pig it is bought 2 drives off ebay first one was from a mac i installed it but it timed my pc out then the pc went into bios mode i eventually got it to read the hard disk by changing the raid autodetect to the one to the left cant remember what it is off hand however the machine wouldnt run in this mode so to get it working i had to hit f2 then change the raid settings back again it works fine till i turn the pc off lol then if i switch back on again i got to wait 2 mins till it times out then go through the above again pmsl dunno what i gotta do with it.

the second hd installed fine i was using it no problem but this was before i switched off after installing the driver for it.when i restarted the hd was just clicking but like i say i was using it before the restart the bios can read the drive but cant tell me the size of it got me baffled as well

these drives are both western digital the same as the one already installed

[todd1970]

im trying to install a second hard drive what a pig it is bought 2 drives off ebay first one was from a mac i installed it but it timed my pc out then the pc went into bios mode i eventually got it to read the hard disk by changing the raid autodetect to the one to the left cant remember what it is off hand however the machine wouldnt run in this mode so to get it working i had to hit f2 then change the raid settings back again it works fine till i turn the pc off lol then if i switch back on again i got to wait 2 mins till it times out then go through the above again pmsl dunno what i gotta do with it.

the second hd installed fine i was using it no problem but this was before i switched off after installing the driver for it.when i restarted the hd was just clicking but like i say i was using it before the restart the bios can read the drive but cant tell me the size of it got me baffled as well

these drives are both western digital the same as the one already installed

Does the PC recognise the drives in my computer ? or does it just show the C drive and your CD-Rom drive being set to D or E ?

[saynowt]

when i mess on with the bios it reconises it but if i leave it as default it dosent see it

[todd1970]

when i mess on with the bios it reconises it but if i leave it as default it dosent see it

What about in the disk managment console..when i format my PC it wont recognise my other drive either untill i change the path of the cd-rom drive to E,,which frees up D then the HD becomes 'active' as the D (data) drive.

[saynowt]

i am gonna try that todd trouble is though the second hard drive i bought off ebay worked straight away it installed then asked for a re boot i checked in my computer and in the system menu it was there and working well as soon as i restarted the pc the second drive just started clicking in the bios it reconized the drive but could not tell what size it was and the pc couldnt see or acess it the first hard drive didnt install it just timed the pc out then went into set up so two different errors lol

[Fruity_Goodness]

you know how a 200gb hdd shows up as about 190gig?

the remaining space is reserved for system files that are important

that includes the MBR (master boot record) i believe (or something along those lines)

A 200 Gb Hard Disk would actually be 200,000,000,000 bytes which is gonna be 200,000,000,000/(1024^3) = 186.3 Gb. Whatever it says on the box always remember to knock off about 7%. True fact.

[cliffc]

A 200 Gb Hard Disk would actually be 200,000,000,000 bytes which is gonna be 200,000,000,000/(1024^3) = 186.3 Gb. Whatever it says on the box always remember to knock off about 7%. True fact.

Hi

To make your dirve work that came out of the mac you format will need format it to a PC format to do this your will need a cd rom that will boot the PC with utils on that will allow you to reformat the disk to a PC format, I would also suggest you check the jumpers to make sure one is set to master and the other one is set to slave if both are set to master it could cause the problems you are discribeing.

And all hard disks will show up at less than the size listed because as you rightly said some of the space is taken up by the MFT and other system files.

Regards

Cliff C

[saynowt]

thanks for the reply cliff i will try the format option but as for the jumpers on a sata hard drive system jumpers apparently are not required for a standard dual disc installation i think they only are required when the system is set for a dual boot

[cliffc]

thanks for the reply cliff i will try the format option but as for the jumpers on a sata hard drive system jumpers apparently are not required for a standard dual disc installation i think they only are required when the system is set for a dual boot

Hi

Nope if thay are SATA you dont need jumpers because the drive plug into there own socket on the main board so thay dont need Jumpers.

Regards

Cliff C