OS Selector Issue with Dual Boot of Windows 7 32 bit and 64 bit

Did you reactivate OSS after booting into Win7 32-bit?

Which drive is the default booting drive?

Was the 32-bit Windows 7 drive disconnected when you installed the 64-bit version to its drive?

Yes I reactivated OSS after rebooting into Win 7 32 bit.

I changed the default to Win 7 64 bit temporarily because I am working on getting all my programs loaded.

No the 32-bit Windows 7 drive was connected to the motherboard at the time I installed the 64-bit version on the other drive.

Initially when I did this before I hid the drives from each other so I just had a C drive with the OS installed when booting into each version of Windows. I had been having MBR issues occasionally on boot and then out of no where the 64 bit version wasnt recognized and I couldnt get the MBR repaired with the Win 7 64 bit OS cd either. So formatted the 64 bit drive and reloaded Windows 64 bit on there. I installed DD 11 and OSS on there but never activated it. Then I booted into the 32 bit version and reactivated the OSS. It recognized everything fine at that point. It is just giving me issues on reboot. Like I said if I boot with the Acronis boot media and select the windows icon then it will load the OSS and I can boot into either system without an issue.

Thanks for the reply Sir. I appreciate it.

OSS recognizes both operating systems without a problem when I boot into each operating system and run OSS. I can boot into both systems without a problem but I must use the acronis boot media to get the loader to operate on reboot.

Can you post a screenshot of what Disk Management shows for the drives? Also, point out which partition holds the main OSS files.

Do you know the exact error message text?

Here is the screen shot of Disk Management.

OSS is installed on both systems but activated on just the 32 bit version.

I have attached a screen shot of the OSS properties for each drive as well.

I will get the error message for you. I need to reboot to get it.

Here is the message:

Starting Acronis Loader......
No commands for booting operating system. Press to reboot

Funny, I rebooted and it loaded right into the OSS and I loaded up the 32 bit version. I restarted and then the message is back.

Is Diskeeper doing a constant-type defrag? Will OSS remain activated if you disable Diskeeper?

If you have OSS installed in Windows so you can use the program to switch between operating systems, it's activated in that OS. There isn't any option to just "install" the program.

Which hard drive is set as the default booting drive? Is it the one with Windows 7 32-bit?

I've never had to reactivate OSS. I activated it on initial install and that is it. Are you saying that since it isnt loading properly at boot that it isnt activated and then the boot media activates it? Then on reboot it isnt activated again until I use the boot media?

Diskeeper is doing a constant defrag but I havent had issues with it before. I will turn it off and see if it makes a difference. I will turn it off and then reactivate in Win 32 bit. I will set Win 32 bit as default also. I have Win 64 bit drive as the default currently.

The OSS booting files are very sensitive to being moved. If stopping Diskeeper helps, you should exclude the OSS booting files from being moved.

ok so to reestablish the connection so to speak, should I reinstall OSS and then exclude these from being defragmented? Also should I prevent the Bootwiz folder from defrag or what other folders do you recommend. C:\bootmgr and C:\Boot\BCD are the ones I should be concerned with? There is a option in OSS that you can select files and folders to not defragment. Should I do it there or in Diskeeper itself? With Win 7 32bit showing as D: should it be using the boot files from Win 7 64bit C: in the OSS, or should this be adjusted? The screen shots I sent you show that Win 7 32bit is using C:'s boot files. I have a few folders in Win 7 32 bit that have the bootwiz folder with boot files just like in the C drive. I can see them in the OSS when I look at the properties of the drive when browsing for boot files to use.

I did a test when I load up with the boot cd and went into DD11 and the 2 OS drives are not visible. My external drive is visible though. Anyway it looks like since OSS isnt loading at boot then it cant display the 2 OS. I can select the windows icon on the boot disc menu and then it will load the OSS and I can select the OS of my choice without a problem. So it looks like it is simply missing the OSS files when I boot.

The defrag exclusion needs to be set in Diskeeper, not OSS. Exclude the main BOOTWIZ folder and the bootwiz.sys file in the root folder (should be on the booting drive).

The drive letters shown by OSS don't always match what Windows shows.

OSS uses the BIOS to access the hardware. Booting into DD 11 would use Linux. DD 11 doesn't include the Safe Mode version included with DD 10 so there's no easy way to check how the drives are being displayed in that mode. With DD 10, you could be fairly certain that DD Safe Mode would display the drives the same as OSS and if it found them okay, OSS would too.

Judging from the number of posts, it seems that OSS 11 is having a problem finding its files on the computer. Whether it's actually the files or the drives, I don't know. Acronis is working on a update to DD, but I don't know which bugs/features are being fixed.

Thanks for the information. I will mess around with it and see. I just dont want to mess with it too much and render the drives unbootable. I have fixed the MBR's before, so that isn't really a problem. Thanks for your efforts. I have a question. If lets say the Win 32 bit drive is the first drive in the boot sequence and I delete that hard drive OS, then I should be able to still access my other drive? It seems like it is just a link broken between the drives and the software. I will post my findings. Take care, Joe

If OSS is installed to the partition you delete, you will loose OSS. You should be able to boot directly to the other drive if it's configured that way and OSS didn't take it over.