Removing one OS from Dual Boot

[Merlin]

I have a dual boot of Vista 32 and Vista 64.
I want to remove the 64 bit OS and leave all of the 32 bit system only
Maybe I'm having a brain fart here, but I dont remember how to do it

Merlin

 

[Kougar]

Actually, I ran into this problem myself! I remembered the hard way that if you dual boat Vista using one OS per drive, you can't remove or modify the other drives without Vista failing to boot. So because I dual-boot XP + Vista, if I modify or unplug the XP drive then Vista won't work despite it being on a different drive.

There may be a way to do this, but so far I think the only option is to rebuild your Vista bootloader using the Vista disc. It actually didn't work for my Vista install though, it couldn't find the Vista install. Which is strange because I've had to do this frequently in the past and usually it works.

 

[Merlin]

Actually, I ran into this problem myself! I remembered the hard way that if you dual boat Vista using one OS per drive, you can't remove or modify the other drives without Vista failing to boot. So because I dual-boot XP + Vista, if I modify or unplug the XP drive then Vista won't work despite it being on a different drive.

There may be a way to do this, but so far I think the only option is to rebuild your Vista bootloader using the Vista disc. It actually didn't work for my Vista install though, it couldn't find the Vista install. Which is strange because I've had to do this frequently in the past and usually it works.

Yeah, That's what I did, putting each OS on different drives, thinking that would be a better way.
Now the other machine I have vista32 bit and WinXP.....I keep it that way just in case.

Thanks....

I'll try to contact MS to see what they would suggest

Merlin

 

[Kougar]

For future reference, it's best to install each OS onto it's own drive WITHOUT the other drive plugged into the system. As long as Vista thinks it is the only OS around you can change drives, boot to either OS at boot, and generally not have to deal with Vista and its singular OS mentality.

 

[Rob Williams]

You can do it very easily with EasyBCD:

http://www.softpedia.com/get/System/OS-Enhancements/EasyBCD.shtml

It's helped me out a few times in the past. If you remove the entry you don't need, it should work fine. If you somehow run into a problem where the machine doesn't boot, booting up like Kougar said with the Vista disc and entering repair mode should fix it quick.

 

[Merlin]

worked

You can do it very easily with EasyBCD:

http://www.softpedia.com/get/System/OS-Enhancements/EasyBCD.shtml

It's helped me out a few times in the past. If you remove the entry you don't need, it should work fine. If you somehow run into a problem where the machine doesn't boot, booting up like Kougar said with the Vista disc and entering repair mode should fix it quick.

Worked great to get it off the boot, now to recover some hard drive real estate, I'll try to delete as much as I can.

Thanks

Merlin