Deleting dual boot OS

i only found one post that was somewhat applicable to my issue of removing a dual boot (http://forums.lenovo.com/t5/ThinkStation/Thinkstation-E20-Dual-boot-from-Windows-7-into-XP/m-p/21871... and that led me on a merry chase. if this is useful to anyone else, great - if posting a solution as an FYI is inappropriate and i should wait to reply to someone with the same issue, pls let me know
the situation: my former IT guys installed W7 Pro x64 (thx, Lenovo, for the free upgrade from Vist Business ) on a new partition alongside XP Pro x32 and it worked great, but i only kept using XP for my !@#$%^ genius scanner, which i have never gotten to run under XP Mode/Virtual PC in W7.
one day, after several months of XP inactivity, i decided to boot into it for some reason and had a BSOD. so then i set out to just eradicate the offending OS and its partition...simple, right? not in this case. i found the guys had put the W7 OS onto a logical drive not a primary:
Local Disk (C
156.71 GB NTFS
Healthy (Boot, Page File, Crash Dump, Logical Drive)
my boot.ini was on the XP partition and W7 uses bootmgr so i poked around and found that EasyBCD should take care of the issue by copying the boot.ini info to bootmgr on C:\ through this link in the SevenForums:
http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/209885-bootmgr-move-c-easybcd.html
again, not so easy. i could not move the bootmgr because of the logical status of the partition and also because the partition wasn't set to active; i converted the partition to active with no troubles under the native Disk Managment but failed when i tried to convert the partition to primary.i feared having to do a wipe and reinstall to tidy up as i saw some (forums unnamed) folks advocating.
i looked into it a bit further and found that i needed to use use a partition tool from bootable media (i used a CD with EaseUS Partition Master - the freeware version ) to convert to primary at boot and then i used the above link to copy the bootmgr to C:\ with EasyBCD
now my OS drive looks like so (the partition is large owing to the GIS files that like living there):
Local Disk (C
226.71 GB NTFS
Healthy (System, Boot, Page File, Active, Crash Dump, Primary Partition)
that solved the problem of the W7 OS being on an inactive, logical drive instead of an active primary - and in future if i set up a dual boot for any other OS, i'll make sure the disk is set as primary before i install and the backwater IT guys here will never touch my machine again
S10 - 642327A

HI Manish_5
"Is it possible to role back to my previous Windows 7 in future" but you have to create now the backup (recovery disk) to later use:
Creating Recovery Discs or Saving a Recovery Image to a USB Flash Drive (Windows 7) | HP® Support
Rollback:
Performing an HP system recovery (Windows 7)

Similar Messages

How to 'Remove' user access from deleted dual boot system's users in existing operating system's folders and files?

I have Windows 7 Enterprise Professional, accessed earlier from (now deleted) other dual boot operating system (User folder), which shows it's users as unknowns for folder properties in Windows 7 Enterprise Professional's "C:\Users\Aniruddha",
which causes system not responding, how to 'Remove' these unknown users from folder properties of "C:\Users\Aniruddha"?
Also "C:\Users\Aniruddha\Application Data" creates many of own folders within eachselfs end folder ("C:\Users\Aniruddha\Application Data" creates a "C:\Users\Aniruddha\Application Data\Application Data", "C:\Users\Aniruddha\Application
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It seems your PC is infected with some malware. Use a trusted antivirus software with the latest definition updates installed to scan and remove the malware.
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Restore Points Deleted w/dual boot & Windows 7

Dual booting with two partitions
on another disk with Windows 7 / Windows 10
and when I returned to Windows 8.1 or
Windows 10 from Windows 7,
restore points are deleted and remain
in Windows 7?
Is there a solution?
Thanks
Hello

Thanks for the reply,
If it's the disks to hide concerned,
I have already done but to no avail ([HKEY_CURRENT_USER \ Software
\ Microsoft \ Windows \ CurrentVersion
\ Policies \ Explorer]).
I know that we could put offline the
affected partitions ([HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
\ SYSTEM \ MountedDevices \ Offline]), but
later by disk failure in the event log
... is that what you propose?
hello
Yes and No.
What do you mean by " but later by disk failure in the event log " ?
Have a look at this tutorial :
http://www.geekstogo.com/forum/topic/326541-windows-8-dual-boot-restore-points/
I am dual booting Win 7 and Win 10 TP Enterprise build 9879. That tutorial works for me.
P.S. ( Ignore the triple boot part.)

EFI partition deleted after removal of dual boot of OSX10.8 and Ubuntu/Linux Mint - using rEFIt

so, i recently installed ubuntu to check out the advances in the linux world since i last looked into them 10+ years ago... very impressed, but when i tried to delete ubuntu and remove the various partitions (which i was able to do just fine using gparted) reFIT still displayed the **** linux logo from the install i deleted....
OSX still boots fine... a install of Linux Mint i have on another partition(s) still boots fine ... everything appears to work... but i want to know what the possible issues are so i can be prepared...
this is frustrating...
so i went in and looked around with the remaining partitions and noticed the EFI partition which hadn't shown before i mistakenly tried to install another distro over ubuntu after wiping the partition it was on...
so i erased the EFI partition hoping that this would remove the g-damned hold out linux boot logo in reFIT... it didn't... now i suppose i can go back in and create a new EFI partition through gparted but that stupid linux logo will still be there... and i'll have another problem of getting the proper information back onto the EFI partition, which i am unsure of how to do, or where to even dig up the proper information...
i want to edit my boot mbr or grub or whatever the eff apple comps use as a boot record so that (or i am using as a boot record since i'm using reFIT) to get rid of this **** logo, so i can install another distro of linux and probably windows without having the **** supernumerary logo...
i would rather not wipe the whole drive (aka the primary partition the recovery partition) and do a fresh new install of os x (mountain lion) because i have OSX set up just the way i want it for personal use and work use... all my various tools and so on...
i don't use time machine and can't do a "restore" from a previous back up...
some one please help me out here, what are my options? am i going to have to bite the bullet and do a wipe of the entire drive and all its partitions to get my MBP back to 'normal'???
PS - using a macbook pro late 2011, standard specs, 13"...

stqn wrote:
Expi1 wrote:Thanks, I'm mostly struggling with how to partition for Arch and then how to do the bootloader. I'm using Win8 64-bit and from what I understand a Legacy BIOS bootloader. I'm not entirely sure what I should be partitioning the C: into, I've done partitions before, just not for Arch and then I'm not sure whether to use GRUB or syslinux, or if I even need those. Or if I need to use GPT or MBR?
Your disk is already partitionned so you don’t have to choose between GPT or MBR, the choice is already made.
You don’t partition “C:”, that is the name of a Windows partition. You partition a drive.
Grub or syslinux, use whatever the beginners guide tells you to. Personally I think syslinux is simpler which is why I’m using it (but I’m not dual-booting, if that matters).
You’re not saying what your problem is with partitionning, so it’s hard to help.
Thanks for getting back to me, I'm not sure if I just create one large partition for Archlinux or if I have to create multiple? Where I'm also confused is with the Creating Filesystems part of the guide. I don't understand how I'd do this in Windows, or what /dev/sda1 is referring to.
As for the bootloader part, the Beginner's Guide gives you a choice between syslinux and grub, what I'm not sure about is which to use considering I'm dualbooting. How it will affect my windows bootloader, do I disregard that and use GRUB now? I'm unclear on how that works.
I'm also aware I need to disable Secure Boot, I just searched my BIOS options and couldn't find anything remotely relating to that, so I'm assuming it's not an issue since this computer was originally on Windows 7 anyway?
Thanks again, Expi.
Last edited by Expi1 (2014-03-06 19:54:30)

HT4818 I want to have an exFAT parition in addition to the Mac OS X and Windows partition. If I create it before running BootCamp, it wants me to delete it. If I create it in either Windows or Mac OS X afterwards, I can no longer dual boot.

I want to have an exFAT parition in addition to the Mac OS X and Windows partition. If I create it before running BootCamp, BootCamp wants me to delete it before continuing. If I create it in either Windows or Mac OS X after running BootCamp and installing both OSes, I can no longer dual boot. What is the magic sequence to get this to work?

I've got the same quandary.
After upgrading my hard drive to a Momentus XT Hybrid and doing a clean install of Mountain Lion, I was surprised that I couldn't format partitions separately and then restore from my clone of the old Windows 7 Partition. I found that I had to use the BootCamp Assistant to manage it all, which essentially meant getting rid of the partitions and starting again...
I now can't get my Windows / BootCamp partition to boot, after adding a 3rd, ExFat, partition, when it was working perfectly fine before. I just get a lot of dos booting failures and a final message that "No boot device is available, press Enter to continue".
See the attached message, that I get when trying to boot the bootcamp partition, through Parallels 7; which also worked perfectly fine before.
Be good to know if there is a work around this in Mountain Lion as, if not, I'm thinking I might skip Bootcamp altogether and just install a machine drive via Parallels. As suggested here:
http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=1420754
I might even keep the virtual windows machine on a separate hard drive and then I'll have no need for the ExFat partitions altogether as that was designated for sharing between Windows and Mac.

How to remove windows 7 safely from my dual boot win7/win8 pc ?

i have a pc which is dual boot with windows 7 ultimate 64 bit & windows 8 pro 64 bit, my pc had four drives C: D: E: F:, windows 7 is on "D:" drive & windows 8 is on C: drive(i had set win8 as current & default OS), now when i opened
disk management i found that the D: drive where win7 is residing is marked as
system,active,primary partition, now i don't want win7 anymore , i want only win8 on my pc, i want to format & get back clean empty D drive to use for other stuff (i don't want to delete the D drive partition), can any one explain me the steps
needed to achieve this safely.

Since you've selected as default OS as Windows 8.1 you can go to disk management console and format the drive as required.
You can remove the Win 7 entry from boot loader:
To launch msconfig:
Click Start
In the Search text box, type msconfig
Launch msconfig by selecting it from the search results above the search text box.
After msconfig is launched:
Go to the Boot tab
Slect the boot entry you want to delete.
Click the Delete button and then click OK.
Arnav Sharma | http://arnavsharma.net/ Please remember to click “Mark as Answer” on the post that helps you, and to click “Unmark as Answer” if a marked post does not actually answer your question. This can be beneficial to other community members reading
the thread.

Is there any possible way I can dual boot Windows with OSX 10.7.2 on a MacBook Pro 15' from 2006?

Hello,
I am new to this forums.
I have searched about dual boot win/mac, but couldn't find a clear answer, so I decided to post this now.
I run a MacBook Pro 15' from 2006 (Intel based) and have upgraded it to OSX 10.7.2 Lion.
I have tried to install windows 7 on a small (20GB) partition by using Bootcamp, but then I've received a notice saying that there was no windows support software available. However, I did install Windows 7 Professional by unchecking that box. After the installation I have downloaded the windows support software and tried to install it but then I've received a notice saying that I can't install it on this machine.
Could you please give me any suggestions on how to dual boot win/mac, if it is possible at all using this machine? And how to safely go back to where I was before (with a single mac OSX 10.7.2 partition)?
Thanks.

This problem has been solved as I just needed to download Boot Camp 4.
Can I delete this post?

Windows 8.0 new dual boot GUI disappeared and replaced with text menu after installing updated 8.0 and 8.1

I upgraded my windows xp to windows 8.0 and my windows 7 to windows 8.1 for a dual boot environment. I am using BCDEDIT program. I had no problem when booting to the GUI menu OF WINDOWS 8 when I first INSTALLED Windows 8. But after the second time
I booted from a cold start it defaulted back to the old text version of the dual boot menu from the old windows xp and 7 . I have tried many times to restore the boot mgr TO GET BACK THE WINDOWS 8 GUI but I can't seem to put my
finger on the root cause remedy that would over-ride the default TEXT VERSION STYLE. I really like the Windows 8 GUI interface. Remember I am not having any problems with booting into the OS of my choice ----- just the BOOTMENUPOLICY.
Here is where I need to resolve the new from the old command. By the way Does the Bcdedit program need to be installed in both OS'S? And when original Windows 7 was installed the os partitioned a Boot 100mb. I cannot remove or delete it in my Disk Management.
Just some other tidbits to ponder from any help I would appreciate.
Thanks
Michael

Hi,
What's the status of your current system boot option? Please check and make sure Windows 8.1 or Windows 8 was first boot.
Roger Lu
TechNet Community Support

New to Solaris - dual boot question

I have been using OpenSolaris on my ThinkPad T400s, dual booting with Windows 7. I want to give Solaris 10 a try. I've had it running in Virtual Box under OS X for a while, and I think I'm comfortable enough to try it out on my ThinkPad. Here is my question: will the Solaris Interactive installer let me install Solaris 10 in my existing OpenSolaris partition? And if it does, will it modify the bootloader so that I can still dual boot with Windows 7? I dont want to have to destroy partitions and re-install Windows. Once its on my hard drive, I can add myself as a user, install the Intel 5300 wireless driver, etc... Anyone have any other issues with Solaris 10 on a T400s?

Okay, well as usually happens, when I resort to help I end up solving my own problem.
In this case however, I still don't have a good grasp of what is going on.
I deleted the partition table with sgdisk --zap-all /dev/sda and then used gdisk to recreate it, specifically setting the code for /dev/sda1 to ef00.
I then reformatted the FAT partition, leaving the other one alone. After mounting /dev/sda1 to /boot and reinstalling linux and grub, I ran:
grub-install --target=x86_64-efi --efi-directory=$esp --bootloader-id=arch_grub --recheck
as described in the wiki, and
grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg
And it worked, including automatically detecting Windows on the other drive. Not sure what went wrong the first time but I'm glad to get it working.
Last edited by egan (2014-12-09 19:46:58)

Can my Macbook Pro support dual boot and Secret World

Hi
My MacBook Pro has the following specs
Processor 2.8 GHz Intel Core i7
Memory 4 GB 1333 MHz DDR3
Graphics Intel HD Graphics 3000 384 MB
Software Mac OS X Lion 10.7.4 (11E53)
I was wondering if it can first of all, support dual boot, because I would like to play a Windows based MMORPG. And I was wondering if there are risks involved? I'm also worried because I like Mac's secure delete trash function and won't having a Windows platform affect that?
Furthermore, can it support playing Secret World with such specs?
Secret World is an MMORPG I'm not sure what the minimum requirements are.. It doesn't say, but anyone has a guess?
-EDIT
OS:      Windows XP (SP 1)/Vista (SP 1)/Windows 7 (SP 1)
PROCESSOR:      2.6 GHZ Intel Core 2 Duo or equivalent AMD CPU
MEMORY: At least 2GB RAM for Windows XP / 3GB RAM for Windows Vista and Windows 7 *
VIDEO CARD:     nVidia 8800 series 512 VRAM or better/Radeon HD3850 512MB or better
DIRECTX: DirectX 9.0c Compatible

If you have an MBP with a Core 2 Duo processor and a clock speed of 2.16 or 2.33 GHz, your max is 3 GB. If you have a 2.2, 2.4, 2.5 or 2.6 GHz clock speed your max is 4 GB.
Check Apple menu > About this Mac for processor type and speed.
I can tell you what you should see - C2D at 2.16 or 2.33 GHz. Those machines have a 3 GB max stated by Apple, but will actually use ~3.2 GB if you have 2 x 2 GB installed, and you get the (marginal) benefit of having a matched pair. In that case, it's also 'normal' for About this Mac to show 4 GB even though the memory controller can only access a little over 3 GB.

How do I repair a Windows 7 partition when it is after Windows 8 partition in a Dual Boot Setup

I have a laptop that I purchased a year ago and which came pre-installed with Windows 8.
Recently, I successfully added Windows 7 as a dual-boot, and this worked OK. To obtain the space for Windows 7, I shrunk the Windows 8 partition.
In Disk Management, the Windows 8 partition is physically located after OEM and EFI partitions; Windows 7 partition is is adjacent to Windows 8.
All went well until I shrunk the Windows 8 partition further to increase the size of the Windows 7 partition, after which Windows 7 came up with a boot error....Windows 8 still boots OK.
I inserted my Windows 7 disk to perform a Startup/Repair, which failed because the first OS partition it sees is Windows 8 and a message tells me that I need to install the correct media for that system.
I searched for advice and assistance to solve the problem....to no avail - and had to completely re-install Windows 7 and the associated applications.....and I really don't want to have to go through this again.
I actually use Windows 7 more than 8, and if I have to lose one or the other, I would dump Windows 8.
So....is there a manageable way I can keep the two systems recoverable and migrateable to another disk in the future. If not, how do I safely remove the Windows 8 partition without damaging Windows 7? Ideally, I would just like to swap the partitions
round....but with EFI and BCD partitions, I am reluctant to go into the unknown.
Sorry....bit of a saga....but would appreciate any advice.
Rob Nick

Hi Rob,
Above all, as the purpose is to enlarge Windows 7 partition, please understand that shrink Windows 8 partition again cannot help on it. A partition can be expanded only if there is free space "after" it.
So you will still need to delete Windows 7 partition for expanding purpose.
If it is fine to just make Windows 7 back to boot order. Please try following command lines.
Note: Please run CMD in Administrator mode.
bcdedit /export “c:\boot”
This is a backup. You can delete it if things go successfully.
Then please create a new entry for Windows 7:
bcdedit /copy {current} /d “Windows 7”
It will provide an entry ID. Copy it and it will be used in following 2 command lines.
bcdedit /set {identifier} device partition=X
Replace X with the drive letter of Windows 7 system located.
bcdedit /displayorder {identifier} /addlast
Please remember to mark the replies as answers if they help and un-mark them if they provide no help. If you have feedback for TechNet Support, contact [email protected]

Dual Boot Ubuntu and Windows 8.1 on HP ENVY dv7

Okay, I've installed 14.04 LTS with EFI and Secure Boot enabled. My problem is that the HP automated boot process ignores the presence of Ubuntu and boots directly into Windows. The only way I can boot into Ubuntu is to intercept the boot process by pressing the Escape key immediately, selecting Boot Device options (F9). choosing "Boot from EFI File", then pressing Enter on the next page (a description of the hard drive), choose EFI from the next screen, select "<ubuntu>" from the subsequent list, the select "shimx64.efi" from the next screen, which gives me the Grub list (without, I might add, any reference to Windows!) So, while it works, it is a laborious process at best. Have tried to follow the following post from an HP help forum:
So, until HP releases an updated UEFI that allows turning this "feature" off or rearranging boot options through the F10 UEFI setup, this is what you can do to get dual boot with the least amount of hackiness:
In Windows, mount the UEFI partition (mountvol S: /S mounts it as the S: drive) and copy the file \EFI\Microsoft\Boot\bootmgfw.efi to use some other name (for example, I copied it to "\EFI\Microsoft\Boot\bootmgfw.efi~", but you can change the name to anything else).
In the Windows command prompt, update the Windows UEFI entry to point to the new name: bcdedit /set {bootmgr} path \EFI\Microsoft\Boot\bootmgfw.efi~ (adapt to your set name accordingly).
Optionally, change the name of the Windows boot loader so that you would be certain that it points to the new file location: bcdedit /set {bootmgr} description "Fixed Windows path"
Install the other OS. In my case the bootloader was installed into \EFI\opensuse\grubx64.efi.
Delete the two files, \EFI\Microsoft\Boot\bootmgfw.efi and \EFI\Boot\bootx64.efi.
Use efibootmgr to delete the "OS boot Manager" entry: sudo efibootmgr -b 0000 -B
Set the new OS bootloader to be the default bootloader by using efibootmgr with the -o option. In my case, I had an entry called "opensuse" in slot Boot0001 and the updated path Windows entry in slot Boot0002, so I had to do sudo efibootmgr -o 0001,0002
Update GRUB to point the Windows entry to your renamed file (you'll have to create a new file in /etc/grub.d and rerun grub-mkconfig).
Was able to do everything as posted except "Delete OS boot Manager", because there is no entry for that item when I run efibootmgr in Ubuntu terminal. I did reorder the boot order using efibootmgr so that Ubuntu was first and Windows was second, but the HP OS boot Manager changes it back!
Would really appreciate any help. Thanks in advance.
SamJ20109

Hey vikas_g,
Welcome to the HP Forums!
With Ubuntu not recognizing your partitions during installation, some information that may be of assistance to you, could be in this document 'Frequently Asked Questions About Linux (FAQs)'.
If your question is not answered from this document, I would suggest asking your question on the Ubuntu Forums.
I hope this information helps!
I worked on behalf of HP

[Forum FAQ]How to customize Windows 7 & Windows 8.1 dual boot menu

Scenario 1:
When you install Windows 8.1 on Windows 7 based computer, the default boot option is Windows 8.1 boot options menu which is shown as Figure 1:
If you want to use the old Windows 7 boot menu, follow these steps:
Start the computer and then go into
Windows 8.1 boot options menu which is shown as Figure 1.
Click
Change defaults or choose other options, and Options menu appears which is shown as Figure 2.
Click
Choose a default operation system option.
Click
Windows 7 Enterprise option to set Windows 7 as the default operating system in the Choose a default operating system menu which is shown as Figure 3.
Restart, and it will be changed to
Windows 7 boot options menu which is as shown as Figure
Scenario 2:
If you have Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 dual-boot configuration, and the default boot menu is Windows 7 boot options menu which is shown as Figure 4.
If you want to get the GUI as Windows 8.1 style, follow these steps:
Boot into Windows 8.1 computer, open the
command Prompt (Admin).
Type the following command
bcdboot c:\Windows and press Enter.
Restart, and you'll see the Windows 8.1 boot options menu which is as shown Figure 1.
Scenario 3:
When you have dual-boot system, one of the system disappear from the boot menu. We could follow these steps to get it back:
Boot the computer from the installation media (Here my example is Windows 7) that works fine system.
Go into
System Recovery Options menu, which is as shown as Figure 6.
Click
Command Prompt link to open the command prompt window
Use the
diskpart and list volume commands to confirm the OS boot drive, the commands are shown as Figure 7.
Backup the bcd file, rename it.
Rebuild a new bcd file. It will scan all disk to confirm all Windows installation on your computer and ask if you want to add them to boot list.
Type
Y to agree with adding to boot list. In next boot, you will get all boot options back in the boot menu.
Please click to vote if the post helps you. This can be beneficial to other community members reading the thread.

Since you've selected as default OS as Windows 8.1 you can go to disk management console and format the drive as required.
You can remove the Win 7 entry from boot loader:
To launch msconfig:
Click Start
In the Search text box, type msconfig
Launch msconfig by selecting it from the search results above the search text box.
After msconfig is launched:
Go to the Boot tab
Slect the boot entry you want to delete.
Click the Delete button and then click OK.
Arnav Sharma | http://arnavsharma.net/ Please remember to click “Mark as Answer” on the post that helps you, and to click “Unmark as Answer” if a marked post does not actually answer your question. This can be beneficial to other community members reading
the thread.

How to install PS CS4 64bit in a Dual Boot system

Hi,
I have just created a dual boot system.
Dell XPS 600 3 gig of ram (soon to be 6 gig
Windows XP Pro 32 bit
Windows Vista Home Premium 64 bit
The windows OS can not see above 2 gig (and that is a long story but believe me I have had it confirmed - even though a 32 bit system should be able to see up to 3.5 gig). That is why I created the dual boot (into Vista 64) OS.
The Vista 64 bit OS CAN see the current 3 gig (soon to be 6 gig).
Each has its own partition and I dual boot via a 3rd party BootIt NG
Question:
1. What is the proper way (if I even can do it) install PS CS4 on to the Vista 64 bit (in another partition) to take advantage of PS CS4 64?
2. Do I have to delete the XP 32 bit version and reactivate?
3. I do not use Bridge (or do I have to in order to get the 64 bit)? I have seen some threads here about using Bridge so I was wondering about that.
4. I also have IL CS4, ID CS4 and plan to do the same. Is that possible?
5. I know there is an issue with plugins so I will address that matter as it comes up. Hopefully, though the downloaded brushes will work ok in both the 32 and 64 bit envrionments.
Thanks in advance,
Bob

Thanks for the responses. Perhaps more of an explanation as to what I have done is in order.
I purchased this Dell XPS 600 XP Pro system some time ago. It was a "boomer" (powerful) system in its' day.
I subsequently increased the Ram to 2gb. I also have a internal 160gb 10K (rpm) Raptor and and another internal WD 250bg (7500 rpm) HD. I drive 3 monitors with a Nvidia 6800 and a Nvidia Dual port 7800 Gt.
So, all in all, the system is still (by today's standards) fairly robust.
BUT, with PS CS4, I tried to up the Ram from my installed Windows XP Pro 2gb system to 3 gb (given that every spec in the world says a 32bit system can see a max of 3 to 3.5 gb).
On my system. Wrong. It (the Windows XP My Computer Properties system would not see over 2 gb (even though BIOS said there was 3gb!) Additionally, BIOS said my board was capable of 64 bit processing.
After hours with DELL tech support (what a waste), I just concluded I should make a Dual boot with Vista Home Premium 64 bit.
I did, and Vista 64 does see the current 3gb in the system. I should add, I am going to make it an 8gb system and my memory will arrive from crucial.com tomorrow.
So Bob, to address your comment. I started (2 years ago?) with Windows XP Pro 32 bit. I have a ton of applications (32 bitters) on the C drive now. But I want the extra addressing (AKA speed potential) capability of a 64bit system. In short, that is the reason for the Dual Boot.
I just cannot burn the 32 bit bridge due to the number of 32 bit apps on it, but I can now utilize a 64 bit architecture for PS CS4, (and as I now am reading ID, and IL CS4 flavors)
Hope I cleared things up.
And as always, thanks
Bob

HOW TO DUAL BOOT W540 with windows 8.1 / 7

I got my W540 recently with windows 8.1 pro on it. but as all engineers worst nightmare windows 8 has hard time with engineering softwares (for my case TIA Portal for PLC programming software which only support windows 7). so i need to have a windows 7. i prefer to keep my windows 8 and have dual boot system with windows 7 added. But i can't install windows 7. initially due to disk type (GPT), then i changed it to MBR without losing my files (which only was possible if i had deleted the recovery partition- now my recovery is on my flash drive). But there are already 4 partitions on the system (1 for C: drive and 3 for recovery and system files which came originally with the product) , how can i install a windows 7? i can't add another partition because that makes my disk a Dynamic disk (which i don't really know what is). all in all, i really need windows 7 on my system ASAP. If anyone know how to fix this please reply. Thanks guys.
Solved!
Go to Solution.

You are limited to four PRIMARY partitions on an MBR disk.
But other than the "active" partition (i.e. the small 100MB "system reserved" partition where Boot Manager is placed from doing a cold Windows install on an empty drive, or the 1.4GB equivalent Boot Manager partition that Lenovo provides along with other tools and utilities), all other partitions on the drive can be "logical". They are not required to be PRIMARY, although Lenovo delivers its partitions that way. But you can change that.
You can have up to 120 LOGICAL partitions on a drive (all of which live inside an originally PRIMARY partition which gets converted to an "extended partition" which houses all of the logical partitions. So if you have at least one logical partition (and thus have to give up one primary partition in order to build that required "extended partitions"), that means you can have up to three remaining primary partitions and up to 120 logical partitions... all on an MBR disk. No "dynamic", and no GPT.
Yes, that means even the Windows system partition itself (i.e. "C") can be on a LOGICAL partition. It's only that one "active" partition (where the BIOS goes to find Boot Manager and its menu, and kick off the rest of the system boot process) which truly must be PRIMARY. That's the only requirement.
So, if you want to use MiniTool's Partition Wizard to carve out sufficient free space for your second Windows 7 partition (by shrinking your existing Win8 partition), you can create one or more logical partitions inside that new free space, and do the Win7 install to one of those empty logical partitions. You can then use a second logical partition in that same free space for "data", if you want.
Note that Partition Wizard can even convert one of your existing primary partitions to logical (i.e. convert it to an "extended partition", inside of which will be then be the original primary partition now converted to logical). You can then shrink or move/resize the partitions on the drive (both primary and logical) however you want, to perhaps make room for additional "logical" partitions inside of that now present "extended partition" which can hold up to 120. You can even convert ALL of your primary partitions except for the one "active" partition (which MUST BE PRIMARY) to logical partitions, which gives you maximum flexibility in having even more than just two bootable OS's along with one or more data partitions, etc., up to 120 logical partitions... plus the one "active" primary Boot Manager "system reserved" partition which must be kept.

Deleting dual boot OS

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