BleepingComputer.com: Windows Vista Drive Letters Messed Up

Greetings,

First off, my system (which i setup dual boot) before was:
C = XP
D = Vista
E = storage
F = storage

So yesterday i got myself into a mess with my system.. and i couldn't get Vista to boot (i think the Master Boot Record was pointing somewhere else).

Tried using Ranish Partition Manager, but when i pointed it to the partition that vista's installed in, it gave me a "NTLDR was not found, press ctrl+alt+del to restart".


Finally Now, i've managed to repair the Vista startup boot (i think), by using the DVD, going into command prompt, and using bootsec.exe to repair the boot sector.


However now, vista starts, and the welcome screen is ok (ie. it shows my account, password i type in it accepts), but after i login, it goes "preparing your desktop" (or something similar, sort of like when i first login). Then it says "Your profile was not loaded correctly. A temporary profile has been made". Looks like a corrupt vista install?

I look into my computer, and see that the drive letters are:
C for Vista
D for XP

I think my Vista's not working because the drive letter for vista is supposed to be D, while XP is supposed to be C.
So i think i have to change my drive letters back to other way around? (ie. C--> D, D-->C).

When i try to do that in Vista, it says it can't do that (change the drive letter C to D) b/c it's a system partition.

I can't boot into XP either, because
1) The Dual-boot screen isn't showing up
and 2) My XP has been acting weird lately, i tried to repair the install, now it says (on boot up): Cannot complete setup in safe mode. please restart" even though I am in normal mode (but i'll try to fix that later) (and no XP didn't cause this problem).

In the Vista repair DVD it shows C as Vista and D as Xp as well. And when i click "repair vista installations" it gives me Vista is on Drive C.


So can someone please help me fix my computer? I think i have to change the drive letters back first (to what it was before), but i don't know how to with one crippled OS which locks the drive letter i need to change.
And of course any addition / other solutions too.

Thanks very much.

Do you think it's because you are in a "temporary" default profile instead of the regular administrator profile? I had to do something and Vista kept saying I needed adm right to do it (!), and finally I had to log into safemode as the adm to get into where I needed to do. Can you get into Safe Mode adm?

Nope..it's all "temporary profile".

There's actually 3 (or more) problems here:

1) The temporary profile is loaded because, for some reason, your system cannot load the regular profile. Before we can work on that, we'll have to fix the boot stuff (which also may fix the profile stuff).

2) The XP issue is different and will require more troubleshooting.

3) The bootup issues are fairly easy to fix using Vista Startup Repair.

Vista will assign itself the C: drive on occasion when you're booting to it, that's not a real issue as the OS is aware enough to deal with those changes (I assigned my Vista to my D: drive when installing it, and it tells me that it's on the C: drive).

I'd suggest using Vista Startup Repair to fix the boot stuff (rather than Ranish) as it performs several checks and repairs while it's running. Here's a link to our tutorial: http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/tutorials/repair-windows-with-windows-startup-repair/

Here's a list of what repairs Startup Repair can make (from http://technet2.microsoft.com/WindowsVista...3.mspx?mfr=true ):

BCDMD - Repairs the MBR, partition table, or boot sector.
ChkDsk - Runs ChkDsk in repair mode.
File Repair - Replaces the corrupt system file with a backup copy.
BootCfg - Reconstructs the BCD.
System Restore - Rolls back the system state by using System Restore.
ACLs fix - Sets the ACLs of the specified file to a default value.
Registry rollback - Replaces the corrupt registry hives with a backup copy.
Change Crash on Audit Failure setting - Disables Windows auditing. Only an administrator can log on to Windows.
Memory Diagnostics - Runs the Windows Memory Diagnostics tool.

Which of these repairs should i make?

Quote

I tried using the automatic one, but it didn't detect any errors.



Also right now I have fixed my XP..re-installed everything (so right now my computer is booting into XP (with no multi-boot screen (can't boot into vista right now))).
I believe i should be using the Vista DVD (repair option somewhere), but like i said I'm not sure which of those repairs i should use.


Thanks alot!

I'd suspect that you'd use the BootBCD - but the automated Startup Repair routine does all of these automatically - so if it doesn't find your Vista installation, then it's a repair that's beyond the capabilities of Startup Repair.

In that case, I'd suggest doing a repair install of your Vista installation according to these directions: http://vistasupport.mvps.org/repair_a_vist...e_vista_dvd.htm

Right now on XP, It's

C: XP
D: Vista


If I use the BootDVD and it says Vista is detected on C, should I still go ahead and do a upgrade repair?

And what if it doesn't find my Vista install? Will i have to do a clean install, or...?

THanks.

Startup Repair is capable of fixing a standard installation even if you dual boot with XP. My concern is what's been done to your partitions by the Ranish Partition Manager - and without attempting the repair I can't tell what effect it will have.

Regardless, when messing with partitions and boot options, it's always advisable to backup your stuff first. That way, if the worst happens, you've saved your data (and won't have to pay someone to recover it for you).

Sorry for the late reply.

In the Vista Repair section, (after i click repair) it says "Windows has found problems with your startup..do you want to repair?". I click "view details", and for some reason this showed up initially:


"The following startup option will be repaired:
Name: Windows Vista ™ Ultimate (Recovered)
Identifier: (a lot of random #s and letters that i don't think are necessary here, but if u need them let me know and i will post them)
Windows Device: Partition=D"

Closing that dialog, in the system recovery options it doesn't list any OS.

However I decided to, before attempting the recovery, boot back into XP and copied some important files onto my external HD. Then going back to the recovery option on the Vista DVD, some stuff changed:


"The following startup option will be repaired:
Name: Windows Vista ™ Ultimate [NOTE: NO "recovered" text]
Identifier: (a lot of random #s and letters that i don't think are necessary here, but if u need them let me know and i will post them)
Windows Device: Partition=Not Found. "

Clicking "no" (don't repair) and going back to the system recovery options dialog, it lists the OS as:

OS: Windows Vista ™ ultimate
Parition size: 0MB
Location: (Unknown) Local Disk

Should i still go ahead and try to recover, or any other steps to take?
Also kindly keep in mind I can currently boot into XP and it's working fine (knock on wood) .

Thanks again!!

Bump?

I dunno. I'd risk it - but it could muck up the access to your XP installation (but I don't think that that is likely).
It would appear that the Ranish Partition Manager has done something to your partition that Windows doesn't like.
I'd still suggest the repair - but wouldn't be surprised if Vista didn't boot unless Startup Repair recognizes the partition.