Vista install on multi-boot system hangs after reboot

Dear All,

So far I've found lots of useful info on this forum, which has enabled me (eventually!) to get a dual-boot with XP-Pro and Vista Business up and running, nicely hidden from each other and loading from OSSelector. However, for the past day or so I've been tearing my hair out trying to get a second Vista OS installed. Hoping somebody might have some ideas.....

Basically, the attempt to install a second Vista OS fails after the first install reboot - it hangs immediately after reboot. Interestingly, I can then see a second Vista entry in the OSS OS list. But attempting to boot from this hangs at the same point.
Note I can successfully install a 2nd XP on same partition, which also reboots during install.

I think I am doing all the right things to install with OSS. At least I'm doing the same as I did for successful install of the XP OS (after wipe disk, install vista #1, install DD/OS), i.e

1. Create new partition for 2nd Vista
2. Boot from OSS recovery disk
3. Mark 1st Vista & XP partitions hidden, 2nd Vista partition unhidden, active
4. Boot from Vista install CD, select to install on new partition
(note I do a 'manual' install cos OSS cant see my CD drive - dunno if that could be part of the problem, though XP install went fine)

As I say, install goes well until first reboot, after which it hangs.

I have also tried to exclude OSS from the equation by adding the following steps in above sequence;

3.1 Deselect OSS Selector, marking either of installed Vista/XP to boot direct
3.2 Boot from recovery disk to reset new partition active, all other partitions hidden.

However, this produced the same result.

I have successfully created on a different machine, with same install CDs, a multi-boot with 2 Vista & 1 XP, but using Windows multi-boot, not OSS.

I have seen some entries on various newsgroups that there may be some hardware/bios issues causing Vista install to hang, but I doubt this can be the case here, since a) its a new Dell (Dimension 9200) which came with Vista installed and b) after wiping the disk I could install 1st Vista no problem.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Krachmacher

 

I hope you have an image backup of your existing XP/Vista/OSS system in case you need it.

Is the partition you're trying to install the 2nd Vista on, on the same hard drive as the others?
[XP Pro ??GB][Vista Business ??GB][Vista Business #2 ??GB]

Or is in on a different physical drive?

You seem to be doing the steps correctly. I would try the procedure with OSS disabled and setting the 2nd Vista partition as active (hide the others) and when Vista asks where to install, pick the advanced options and format the partition using Vista. I've had this happen with XP before and letting the install format the partition fixed it.

Another option you could try, if you have a clean image your first Vista partition, would be to restore it to the new partition, boot from Vista's DVD and do the repair to make it boot. Then install/reactive OSS.

 

Thanks for reply, MudCrab.

All partitions are on the same drive - there's only one (not strictly true. Its a dual disc RAID-0, which I initially tried splitting to 2 'normal' discs, but couldn't get it to work, cant remember now what the problem was.) Are there issues regarding whether partitions are on same disc or not?
Layout;
[Vista Business 30GB][unallocated 200GB][OSS 10GB][XP 30GB][Vista #2 (Home) 30GB]

I'll try your suggestion of letting the install format the partition.

I don't have an image of the first Vista to try your second suggestion. In any case, I need to install a different Vista version (and I've no imaging software). But I may try it out of interest with a trial version of True Image.

 

The problem is usually when installing on a 2nd drive not when installing all on the same drive.

Why did you give OSS 10GB?
Do you put other files on that partition?

You may want to consider your layout. If all the partitions are primary you won't be able to use your unallocated space. (And 200GB is a lot of space to waste.) You can only have 4 primary partitions or 3 primary and an extended partition (which holds logicals). The extended partition should be after all primary partitions on the drive.

I would recommend something like:
[Vista Business 30GB primary][XP #1 30GB primary][Vista #2 Home 30GB primary][OSS 10GB logical][unallocated logical]

If you want to keep the 200GB available for resizing the Vista Business partition larger then you should be okay the way you are.

 

Thanks Mudcrab,

Letting the Vista install format the partition fixed the problem.

FYI, I had a further couple of problems before everything was booting properly;

1) OSS wasn't seeing the new Vista, fixed by re-installing OSS (!)
2) Hidden flag for new Vista was set & greyed-out, fixed by editing BOOTWIZ\bootwiz.oss on the OSS partition

Now I just need to sweep up all those clumps of hair lying around my desk

 

I'm glad it worked.

1) At least you didn't have to fight OSS
2) A common problem (aka "BUG") with OSS, but easily fixed

No need for that... just remove all the rest of the hair from your head, clean your head thoroughly to remove all lingering traces of the previous hair installation and do a hair reinstall. You may want to update to the new hair build (I hear it's more resistant to being pulled out.)