2 hard drives, mixed up and need to format

Leifio

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Nov 20, 2011
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hi,
i recently got a new computer with 2 500gb hard drives. I did a new install of windows 7 ultimate and installed many things like microsoft word, etc. I then gave my other hard drive a letter and realized that i cannot use it for storage because it is in FAT32 format. When i tried to format, windows did not let me and it said that it cannot format the system partition on the hard drive. I looked in disk management and realized that i installed windows on drive 1 instead of drive 0. I just need both drives in NTFS format and i dont know how to fix this. sorry if the screen shot is too small.


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Solution
Option 1 isn't as difficult as it sounds, you literally just unplug a SATA cable from the motherboard, install Windows and then on reboot, plug it back in. If you happen to leave the FAT32 one plugged in...no worries Windows 7 should format it for you in NTFS.

This screen is where you format it.
installwindows711driveoo.jpg


Then this screen apears
Install-Windows-7-12-format.jpg


Though if you're still hesitant(I can understand) here is a quick tutorial I just found on sevenforums.

Yep, you can move the boot files, no problems. You will not have to reconfigure anything. And you can fully test after...

cliffro

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Aug 30, 2007
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There are 2 options you have that "I" am aware of.

Option 1:Reinstall Windows, with only 1 hard drive plugged in(avoiding that mess again)

Option 2: Research on how to move your BootMGR to the drive Windows is on.

I Could do the work for you, but it's much more satisfying when you figure it out on your own without someone spelling it out for you.

I do feel your pain though, I've gotten in a hurry and installed Windows on what I thought was drive 0 only to realize later it was drive 1. Fortunately now Windows is on a drive that is easily distinguished from the others. Where as before I had 2 Identical Seagate drives and one had windows.
 

Leifio

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Nov 20, 2011
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thank you for your reply,
i dont think i will be able to take out the hard drives, so i guess the 2nd option is the best for me. i dont really mind having the c drive as the 2nd hard drive since i wont be upgrading any time soon. Do you or anyone else know how to move bootMGR to a different drive?
thanks again
 

cliffro

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Aug 30, 2007
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Option 1 isn't as difficult as it sounds, you literally just unplug a SATA cable from the motherboard, install Windows and then on reboot, plug it back in. If you happen to leave the FAT32 one plugged in...no worries Windows 7 should format it for you in NTFS.

This screen is where you format it.
installwindows711driveoo.jpg


Then this screen apears
Install-Windows-7-12-format.jpg


Though if you're still hesitant(I can understand) here is a quick tutorial I just found on sevenforums.

Yep, you can move the boot files, no problems. You will not have to reconfigure anything. And you can fully test after you do it so you will know for sure that you can delete the original boot files.

Copy bootmgr to the 7 drive. Then copy the boot folder to the 7 drive, ignoring the warning that it can't copy bcd and bcd.log. Just tell it to skip them.

Then do from elevated command prompt(type cmd into the start menu search and right click and run as admin) :

bcdedit /export X:\boot\bcd

where X is your 7 drive.


[strike]Change bios to boot from 7 drive and you should be good to go.[/strike]

As a side note, you can take ownership of the boot folder and then delete all the language folders inside that do not apply to you. All that is needed to keep is one folder for your language (en-US), the fonts folder, bcd, bootstat.dat and memtest.exe.

[strike]Also, your Win 7 partition should be set as active.[/strike]

Part in red is my edit to the post. You will most likely have to do this to do the above
snagprogram0009.png
 
Solution

Leifio

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Nov 20, 2011
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thank you greatly for your effort, i will have to continue tomorrow and i will post back here the outcome
also this is a laptop sager np 8170 so im not sure on unplugging the hard drives
 

Leifio

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Nov 20, 2011
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ok ive put the bcd files and the boot folder and bootmgr on drive c:, can anyone provide futrher instructions on how to test? (i dont really feel safe trying on my own and experimenting with this new computer)