OS choices menu

August 24th, 2004, 2:38 pm

Does anyone know how to remove an OS from the OS menu that comes up before windows. I had two copies of XP installed and recently removed one, but...the copy still shows up on the choices menu. How do i remove it? any one?

[labrego]

August 24th, 2004, 3:05 pm

1- Open control panel and then system
2- Select the "advanced" tab in system window
3- Click the settings button in Startup and recovery section
4- In the next window you should see a button labeld Edit (actualy there's a label saying "to edit the startup option file manually click edit" on the left of this button)
5-When you click on this button a file called boot.ini is open, check the section labeled [operating systems], there you should see two lines like this:
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINNT="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect
6-Remove one of the lines
7-Save the file and reboot

Let me know if this works for you

[ATNO/TW]

August 24th, 2004, 3:18 pm

Dude -- be a little carefull with that. If you delete the wrong one, you might find yourself reinstalling again as you will no longer have the option to boot to the good one.

It will probably be the one labeled
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)

Partition 1 should be the good one. (You might want to Google around and try to confirm that before you try it. It's been awhile since I did that and I'm going on memory).

Rather than deleting the line, just type the letters REM and a space in front of it. That way if it gets screwed up, you could possibly boot to safe mode and change it back.

[ATNO/TW]

August 24th, 2004, 3:27 pm

Here:

http://is-it-true.org/nt/atips/atips136.shtml

That link explains it pretty well.

I forgot about the [any text] option. I would use that approach instead. Based on what I just read there you just may have multiple versions of partition1. Although I didn't stated there the default (good) one should be the first one listed.

August 25th, 2004, 11:35 am

i removed the right one, but now i get another option, this one says "windows (default)". What does this mean. and if i click on it again, i get the same error message as before.

[ATNO/TW]

August 25th, 2004, 12:00 pm

Hmmmm - not sure. If you only have one in the boot.ini you shouldn't even see the screen. If should go right to the Windows loading stuff.

If it helps, this is what my boot.ini kooks like:

Quote:

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect

This assumes your XP is on the first and only partition. (mine is actually on partition 2 but I changed it for the example.) I'm not suggesting that mine will work for you, but it is a typical one and should do the trick. At least you can compare that to yours and see what the differences are.

August 25th, 2004, 2:48 pm

risingsun wrote:

i removed the right one, but now i get another option, this one says "windows (default)". What does this mean. and if i click on it again, i get the same error message as before.

That happens when the specified Default doesn't match the any of the entries under [operating systems].

example:

Code: [ Download ] [ Select ]

[boot loader]
timeout=10
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect

1. [boot loader]
2. timeout=10
3. default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS
4. [operating systems]
5. multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect

I changed mine to the above and it did indeed add Windows (Default) to my boot menu.

Here's a useful tip: Get a blank formatted floppy and copy the following files from your boot partition:

boot.ini
ntldr
ntdetect.com

These files can be found on the root of your boot partition. They are hidden so you will have to copy them from a command prompt or enable show hidden and system files. In case you your boot.ini file gets trashed, you can use the floppy disk to boot into windows normally and then repair boot.ini.

Edit: I forgot to mention that you will need to format the disk from within Windows 2K/XP. Just right click on the Floppy drive icon and select format. Don't check ''Create an MS-DOS Startup Disk". Just leave that option unchecked. A fresh floppy out of the box will not work.

Hmm, this gives me an idea for a possible recovery solution for the ntoskrnl debacle. If my idea works I'll post it in the ntoskrnl thread.

August 27th, 2004, 11:12 pm

thanks a lot guys, it worked.

February 1st, 2009, 10:37 am

Hey i have basically the same problem as risingsun but only difference here is that in my boot.ini file it says:

Code: [ Download ] [ Select ]

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect

1. [boot loader]
2. timeout=30
3. default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS
4. [operating systems]
5. multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect
6. multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect

They are both identical. So, my question is, in the OS Choices menu when the pc boots, are the OS's listed in the same order as they are here?
For example, on my OS choices menu it says:

Microsoft Windows XP Professional
Microsoft Windows XP Professional

The first one is the one i would like to remove. To do this, could i just remove the first line in my boot.ini file?

Thanks
-Ad

February 3rd, 2009, 12:23 pm

bump

[grinch2171]

February 3rd, 2009, 12:30 pm

You are correct.

February 5th, 2009, 6:34 am

adamino_2 wrote:

Hey i have basically the same problem as risingsun but only difference here is that in my boot.ini file it says:

Code: [ Download ] [ Select ]

 
[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect
 

1.  
2. [boot loader]
3. timeout=30
4. default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS
5. [operating systems]
6. multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect
7. multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect
8.  

They are both identical. So, my question is, in the OS Choices menu when the pc boots, are the OS's listed in the same order as they are here?
For example, on my OS choices menu it says:

Microsoft Windows XP Professional
Microsoft Windows XP Professional

The first one is the one i would like to remove. To do this, could i just remove the first line in my boot.ini file?

Thanks
-Ad

default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS is the one your computer is booting in to if your not picking the other one at boot so that being said the one that is not default should be the one removed if you dont want to see the choices.. or just set the time to 1 so it will just flash on flash off..