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SparkChaser
Premium Member
join:2000-06-06
Downingtown, PA

SparkChaser

Premium Member

[WIN8] Dual booting Win 7 when Win 8 exist first.

Anyone add Win 7 to a Win 8 machine?

I have a new HP minitower that has Win 8 on it. I could not find anything local that had win 7. I'd like to put Win 7 on it, preferably dual boot.

Any information appreciated.
BlitzenZeus
Burnt Out Cynic
Premium Member
join:2000-01-13

BlitzenZeus

Premium Member

Another user here had it toast his Win XP partition by 'fixing it' with chkdsk automatically on a startup, and it's been theorized this was caused by their new ntfs. The problem with corrupting ntfs partitions between versions was reported in beta, but not solved.

I suggest you disable secure boot first of all, put in another hdd while disconnecting the Win 8 drive, and install it to that drive if you're able to do that. Use the bios boot menu. However I've also come across a strange issue, when i had two drives with active bootloaders even if it was nix it prevented Win 8 from booting just by being connected. The original problem was that I was moving somebodies old hdd into a new Win 8 system, and Win 8 would never, I repeat never boot when the other drive was connected, as soon as it no longer held a bootloader Win 8 booted fine... Lets all thank Microsoft for more problems, but now associated with the hardware.

SparkChaser
Premium Member
join:2000-06-06
Downingtown, PA

SparkChaser

Premium Member

thanks, yes I disabled the secure boot but haven't gone any farther.

I also tried to disable the UI but found that everything seems to be written for the developers copy. The registry items they modify don't exist in this version.
BlitzenZeus
Burnt Out Cynic
Premium Member
join:2000-01-13

BlitzenZeus

Premium Member

I should have said it before, but you should always install the oldest first, and on these new Win 8 computers they have so many oem and recovery partitions I would think making a new partiton would break that recovery process. That is why I at least recommend a second hdd for Win 7 only, and could be operated without the Win 8 drive being present removing the software bootloader problem.

Since you already have Win 8 try to get used to it, or just put on Win 7 on it. In an emergency you should be able to restore Win 8 if you needed to if you didn't kill the recovery partitions, but make sure you don't have issues with proprietary hardware first.

SparkChaser
Premium Member
join:2000-06-06
Downingtown, PA

SparkChaser

Premium Member

said by BlitzenZeus:

I should have said it before, but you should always install the oldest first, and on these new Win 8 computers they have so many oem and recovery partitions I would think making a new partiton would break that recovery process.

Yes, I came to the same conclusion. There are a couple of extra partitions that are new to me besides the recovery one. I wanted to make sure before I opened the Win 7 box. I think I'll return it and try to live with 8. I don't want $130 just sitting on the shelf.

captokita
Premium Member
join:2005-02-22
Calabash, NC

captokita to BlitzenZeus

Premium Member

to BlitzenZeus
said by BlitzenZeus:

Another user here had it toast his Win XP partition by 'fixing it' with chkdsk automatically on a startup, and it's been theorized this was caused by their new ntfs. The problem with corrupting ntfs partitions between versions was reported in beta, but not solved.

*waves hand* oooh! oooh! ME!

As you said, if the OP wants to dual boot 7+8, I would also suggest adding a 2nd drive, and moving the 8 drive to the 2nd SATA port on the motherboard. Then, once you've installed/updated/etc Win 7, you can choose which OS to load into by choosing the boot device in startup. (usually F12), just choose which drive/OS you want. Win 7 will work (supposedly) in that secure boot environment that comes on all these new Win8 systems, but I would turn all that off anyway. Win8 will also continue to function without it.

As a side - notice there are no COAs on these systems with Win8 on them? What's up with that?

SparkChaser
Premium Member
join:2000-06-06
Downingtown, PA

1 edit

SparkChaser

Premium Member

If I don't laugh I'll cry.

I decided to open up the win 7 OS and install it. I unpluged all the drives except one.

Put in DVD, it does its thing for a couple of minutes and then says it needs a driver for the DVD drive. Now, it just used it for 2 minutes but okay. This seems to have been a problem for a few years with a variety of causes. I look all over for what it wants. Can't find anything it likes. Then I notice that the win 8 says SCSI. Hmmm, I took a look at the BIOS and it has SATA emulation and it's set to RAID

HP and MS seem to have thrown in every roadblock they could to stop Win 7.

EDIT: changed emulation.
SparkChaser

SparkChaser

Premium Member

WhooooWeeee!

Got WIN7 installed. Not dual booted but installed thanks to RAID drivers from Gigabyte who makes the mother board. Then a gazillion updates and more drivers.