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cycovision - pc help thread |
Cycovision
Joined: Nov 30, 2003
Posts: > 500
From: England
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Cracking idea! you have a PM
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Cycovision
Joined: Nov 30, 2003
Posts: > 500
From: England
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How to get rid of the OS boot selection menu
Sometimes, when you've reinstalled windows XP or made changes to your computer's hardware, you might find that you get a strange menu when you switch your PC on asking you which OS you'd like to boot. Whilst it's not exactly a problem, it can be a bit annoying so here's how to get rid of it.
1. Switch on the PC and, when your presented with the menu, select whichever one actually works (usually the top one)!
2. Once you're in windows, open 'My Computer' and double-click on the C: drive (or whatever hard drive your OS is installed on).
3. Click on 'tools' in the menu at the top and select 'folder options'.
4. In the folder options window, click on the 'view' tab.
5. Look in the box for the entry that says 'show hidden files and folders'. click on the radio button next to it.
6. Directly below this option, you'll see 'hide extensions for known file types' and 'hide protected operating system files (recommended)'. un-tick both of these and click 'ok' to any warnings you might recieve.
7. Click 'OK' on the folder options window.
8. You'll now see a few previously invisible files appear. Look for one called 'boot.ini', right-click on it and select 'properties'.
9. The properties windows will appear. Look at the bottom and un-tick the 'read only' box. click 'OK'
10. double click on boot.ini to open it in notepad.
11. You'll see something like this:
[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 /NoExecute=OptOut
But yours will have one or more entries under the [operating systems] bit, like this:
[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 /NoExecute=OptOut
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional"
It might be different, but you will have two or more. DO NOT DELETE ANYTHING YET!
12. In notepad, click 'file', 'save as...' and change the filename from 'boot.ini' to 'boot.old'. Change the file type drop down box from 'text files' to 'all files', then click 'save'. This creates a back up in case anything goes wrong!
13. Now, delete the extra entry / entries so that you only have something like:
[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 /NoExecute=OptOut
In other words, only one line under the [operating systems] bit.
14. In notepad, click 'file', 'save as' and save it as 'boot.ini'. IMPORTANT: Don't forget to select the file type as 'all files' and not the default 'text files' otherwise it won't work!
15. Close notepad, right click on the 'boot.ini' file and set it back to read only.
16. That's it! next time you reboot, it'll go straight into windows!
If your PC fails to start up next time, don't panic! as long as you have access to a windows XP installation disk, we can easilly put the backup boot.ini file that you made back in using the repair console. All you need to do is:
1. Put the XP disk in and get the PC to boot from it.
2. When asked, press 'r' to open the repair console.
3. Type in the following, exactly as it's printed here, in order, pressing enter after each line:
c:
del boot.ini
ren boot.old boot.ini
4. Take the XP disk out of the drive and press CTRL, ALT and DELETE to reboot. Job's a good un!
_________________
'He who laughs last, laughs longest. Or didn't get the joke...'
[ This Message was edited by: Cycovision on 2006-02-16 19:40 ] |
rrojas260
Joined: Dec 13, 2003
Posts: > 500
From: Valencia, Venezuela
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@cyco
Two Qs
1) I have installed Windows Vista Beta on my main HDD, how do i uninstall it without deleting the entire drive or partition?
2) My PC has 2 HDD, (120GB, 40GB) on the big one i have my main OS Windows XP and all my documents and in the small one i have my secundary OS (also XP but without any updates or anything). Every week i copy all my documents from my main HD to my secundary one as a backup but sometimes i forget or i dont have the time so i was wondering if there is any program that could do that task automaticly.
Thx
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Cycovision
Joined: Nov 30, 2003
Posts: > 500
From: England
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1. You can't actually uninstall vista (or ony win OS for that matter) like you can an application. If you installed vista on a second partition (different one to XP) then you can only use windows disk management to format and / or delete the partition.
If you installed vista onto the same partition as XP then you've got a problem! The only way would be to manually delete all of the vista files and folders and change boot.ini to remove the option to boot to Vista. I really don't recommend doing this though.
2. There's tons of good backup software out there, some of it free although one of my favourites is WinBackup:
http://www.acesoft.net/backup[....]/backup_software_winbackup.htm
It costs about $40 so it's not mega expensive and it does exactly what you need.
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rrojas260
Joined: Dec 13, 2003
Posts: > 500
From: Valencia, Venezuela
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I have Vista in a separate partition but i didnt wanted to get errors in the boot.ini if the partition was deleted, i will try to edit it manually.
Thx.
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Cycovision
Joined: Nov 30, 2003
Posts: > 500
From: England
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Yeah, you should have no major problems just formatting the partition. Just make sure that the active boot.ini file isn't stored on the vista partition first. It shouldn't be, but vista is still in beta and we all know what M$ are like 
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solidsingh
Joined: Jan 15, 2004
Posts: > 500
From: india
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hey i have a set of speaker which i need some extension cables for but i dunno which ones.
i have creative p580 5.1 speakers and need 2 extension cables bout 3m long.
anyone know where i can buy em from?
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p900 lover
Joined: Jan 08, 2004
Posts: > 500
From: London
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@Cycovision, bit of a random question but i was thinking the other day if somthing went wrong with my PC what part would be most expensive to replace?
Thanks
dAn
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Gigs
Joined: Jan 19, 2004
Posts: > 500
From: The planet Snibertron!
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um Cyco... 
If wanting to get rid of the OS boot selection menu why not simply do it from the system properties, select the default OS, set it for 0 seconds, you won't see it at all. (If i recall right there's a check box for even showing the menu no? Not on my home machine so no form of reference atm.. specially now i have the vista loader to contend with  )
Never turning the PC off helps too 
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Cycovision
Joined: Nov 30, 2003
Posts: > 500
From: England
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@Gigs because I like to do things properly 
Seriously though, that's a good tip although i've found it sometimes just gets stuck on the boot menu indefinately if you set the timeout to zero.
_________________
'He who laughs last, laughs longest. Or didn't get the joke...'
[ This Message was edited by: Cycovision on 2006-02-20 08:48 ] |
max99
Joined: Nov 24, 2004
Posts: > 500
From: Manchester (@ Uni)
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Help !
lol
basically think got some kind of virus or something.
Everytime i open internet explorer after about 30 seconds it closes.
I'm using firefox now to post this as i cant in IE.
I've just realised how much faster firefox is but my rents still prefer IE .
Are there any free software i can use to get rid of this
Thanks
[addsig] |
Cycovision
Joined: Nov 30, 2003
Posts: > 500
From: England
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You haven't got yahoo toolbar installed have you? That can cause IE to close itself. Uninstall it from add / remove programs if you have.
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max99
Joined: Nov 24, 2004
Posts: > 500
From: Manchester (@ Uni)
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nope dnt have yahoo thingy.
[addsig] |
Cycovision
Joined: Nov 30, 2003
Posts: > 500
From: England
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Ok, run a virus scan, use AVG Free if you haven't got any antivirus at the moment, then try ieFix:
http://windowsxp.mvps.org/IEFIX.htm
You might need your XP / ME / 98 disk, it'll ask you for it if it does.
Unistall any toolbars at all that you might have, including google toolbar.
Then run the usual antispyware stuff, adaware, spybot search and destroy etc.
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max99
Joined: Nov 24, 2004
Posts: > 500
From: Manchester (@ Uni)
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ok i will do that
right it first happened when i was in the thread that axxxr posted about custom made viruses
now i just went into that again in firefox and exactly the same thing happened
bit odd
[addsig] |
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Posted: 2006-02-16 19:49
/ Nokia = 
