PCLOS and Windows 7 Don't Play Nice When Dual Booting

[r2r]

Hi all,

I've been trying PCLOS 2010 for several weeks using several different methods.  I love it and want to dual boot it on my Windows 7 64-bit machine. Tonight I just attempted (for the third time) to create a dual boot using PCLOS 2010 on a Windows 7 machine; however, it's not booting correctly.  Upon firing up the machine, I do get the Windows boot screen but there is no option to select an OS--it just automatically boots straight into PCLOS. I did run the Windows 7 repair disk, but it tells me it found no problem. After some research, I found an article (http://s.pangonilo.com/index.php/2009/10/linux-and-windows-7-dual-boot.html) where this problem was overcome by running the Windows 7 repair disk and then restoring Windows to a previous restore point.  I did this but I got the message that there were NO saved restore points. Ai yi yi!

Does anyone have any suggestions?  I do need to dual boot as I utilize several Windows programs in my line of work.

Thanks,
r2r

[uncleV]

There is plenty of suggestions in "Hard Drive Installation" section.

Mine is - if you reinstall now PCLOS you should have a choice at boot time for it or for Windows.

[r2r]

Thanks uncleV,

I have scoured just about everything I can regarding this.  I have dual booted PCLOS and XP w/ no problems; however, Windows 7 is a different animal altogether and therein lies the rub.

Let me make sure I understand you correctly: you believe that reinstalling PCLOS should offer me a choice at boot time?  Is there something I should do differently when reinstalling?  I used the default settings offered by PCLOS.

Regards,
r2r

[uncleV]

I used the default settings offered by PCLOS.

I see.
Would you describe "default"? Which one of them did you use?

May be for next reinstalling we will choose another option. The problem seems to be not so complex, at least for now.

[uncleV]

And did you install PCLOS after Windows?

[sammy2fish]

Hmmm.  I found the dual-boot between PCLOS and win7, just as easy as between PCLOS and winxp.

Providing windows was installed first...

[r2r]

Yes, I installed PCLOS on an existing Windows 7 machine.  Here are the settings:
     Bootloader to use: GRUB with graphical menu
     Boot device: /dev/sda (Western Digital Corp. WD6400AAKS-7
     Boot system setup:  *linux (/boot/vmlinuz)
                                  linux-nonfb (/boot/vmlinuz)
                                  failsafe (/boot/vmlinuz)

Hope that helps, uncleV!

r2r

[r2r]

Hmmm.  I found the dual-boot between PCLOS and win7, just as easy as between PCLOS and winxp.

Providing windows was installed first...

I wish I could say the same thing.  I had absolutely no problems when installing on XP box.

[uncleV]

One thing to try while we are thinking is "Redo MBR" (Restore MBR) from Live CD session.

Would you post the whole content of menu.lst, please?

[uncleV]

Are win7 and PCLOS on different drives? If so it is possible  you put PCLOS's on it's drive and it didn't overwrite Win's loader so it is loading unaffected by GRUB.

[r2r]

One thing to try while we are thinking is "Redo MBR" (Restore MBR) from Live CD session.

Would you post the whole content of menu.lst, please?

Sorry, uncleV, I'm pretty much a noob when it comes to Linux.  Are you referring to the boot menu?

[r2r]

Are win7 and PCLOS on different drives? If so it is possible  you put PCLOS's on it's drive and it didn't overwrite Win's loader so it is loading unaffected by GRUB.

No, they are on the same drive.  I made 40GB of space and then installed PCLOS.

[djohnston]

Open a terminal. Type:

cat /boot/grub/menu.lst

Copy and paste the results.

[r2r]

Open a terminal. Type:

cat /boot/grub/menu.lst

Copy and paste the results.

Ok DJ, I'm doing something wrong because it returns "No such file or directory"

[uncleV]

About Redo MBR.
When you boot PCLOS from the LiveCD (the install disk) there you go PC-->More applications-->Configuration you'll see Redo MBR/Restore MBR. If you run it it should fix the problem.