Solved Dual Boot Windows 8 and Windows 8

petepraise

New Member
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3
Location
Scotland
I have read many duel boot posts around the net, the problem is no-one is doing this. They are all using a different OS as the second option. I have installed two windows 8 on two separate hard drives. (Both are fully activated and legal). I can choose what OS to boot to if I press F8 and bring up the BIOS boot option. I would like the new windows 8 GUI boot selector. I've tried many things to no avail :cry:

Some additional info
On the OS's if I go into the system and select the boot tab it only shows one OS not 2
I put in the win disk expecting to get a choice of which HD to work with but it just said Windows 8 so I wouldn't know what disk I would be working on. I was going to try a boot repair on the 2nd installed.
I disconnected the Win 8 upgrade from Vista Hd when installing 2nd then reconnected and activated 2nd with all hd's present.
As far as using them is concerned they work fine, the reason I've done this is I want one for all my computing needs and a second bare bones no frills to run recording studio. Only problem encountered with running is for some reason studio windows 8 can't see my DVD drive, I need to get that sorted and they are both running sweet. First has all software installed.
Any suggestions would be great as Its bugging me
thanks
PP
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    windows 8 pro
The fast and easiest way is to use Easybcd

You can have different name of Win8 when boot say

Win8 Computing
Win8 Studio

It's easy to use nomatter add OS , iso , vhd ....
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    windows 8
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
Thats what I did with 2 versions of Windows 7 - But you can simply edit the Boot.Ini of the first drive in the chain to use the customised OS descriptions. Windows 8 does not have this, but you can use EasyBCD or Windows 8 Manager to customise the boot. Windows 8 hides this info somewhere, it does not use Boot.ini unless it is hidden somewhere rather than in the root directory like Windows 7 has it.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8 Pro with Media Center/Windows 7
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Asus M2N-MX SE Plus § DualCore AMD Athlon 64 X2, 2300 MHz (11.5 x 200) 4400+ § Corsair Value Select
    CPU
    AMD 4400+/4200+
    Motherboard
    Asus M2N-MX SE Plus/Asus A8M2N-LA (NodusM)
    Memory
    2 GB/3GB
    Graphics Card(s)
    GeForce 8400 GS/GeForce 210
    Sound Card
    nVIDIA GT218 - High Definition Audio Controller
    Monitor(s) Displays
    Hitachi 40" LCD HDTV
    Screen Resolution
    "1842 x 1036"
    Hard Drives
    WDC WD50 00AAKS-007AA SCSI Disk Device
    ST1000DL 002-9TT153 SCSI Disk Device
    WDC WD3200AAJB-00J3A0 ATA Device
    WDC WD32 WD-WCAPZ2942630 USB Device
    WD My Book 1140 USB Device
    PSU
    Works 550w
    Case
    MSI "M-Box"
    Cooling
    Water Cooled
    Keyboard
    Dell Keyboard
    Mouse
    Microsoft Intellimouse
    Internet Speed
    Cable Medium Speed
    Browser
    Chrome/IE 10
    Antivirus
    Eset NOD32 6.x/Win Defend
    Other Info
    Recently lost my Windows 8 on my main PC, had to go back to Windows 7.
I think the easiest solution is simply virtualize the recording OS in a virtual machine, an OS within an OS. But the thing with that is is that it probably might not yield the best performance unless of course, you tell us your PC's technical specs. :cool:

You can dual boot Windows 8 with Windows 8, I've done this before with the RTM trial and a previous version of Windows 8.

The other suggestion as someone posted, use EasyBCD to edit the boot records.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8.1 Pro
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    ASUS
    CPU
    AMD FX 8320
    Motherboard
    Crosshair V Formula-Z
    Memory
    16 gig DDR3
    Graphics Card(s)
    ASUS R9 270
    Screen Resolution
    1440x900
    Hard Drives
    1 TB Seagate Barracuda (starting to hate Seagate)
    x2 3 TB Toshibas
    Windows 8.1 is installed on a SanDisk Ultra Plus 256 GB
    PSU
    OCZ 500 watt
    Case
    A current work in progres as I'll be building the physical case myself. It shall be fantastic.
    Cooling
    Arctic Cooler with 3 heatpipes
    Keyboard
    Logitech K750 wireless solar powered keyboard
    Mouse
    Microsoft Touch Mouse
    Browser
    Internet Explorer 11
    Antivirus
    Windows Defender, but I might go back on KIS 2014
Thank's for the input. Apart from the studio one not seeing the DVD drive - which I will need to sort - they are both working very well. It's just the one doesn't seem to know there is another present and all the duel boot items I've read say in the boot tab the OS loaded would be top reading current and the other listed below it. In mine it's one single OS and I thought that strange. I looked at the BCD but it seemed to be based around Vista and my system was pretty reluctant to download it. - could be Kaspersky - I just wanted the win 8 GUI at start up and it seems strange it hasn't appeared when there are two OS. The PC is Asus P6T deluxe v2 i7 920 12GB Ram 2 ATI cards running 3 monitors and a 32inch flat screen. I use Cubase 7 and Wavelab so I would want to stay with hardware windows I think it would give better latency in the recording.
I think my main question would be why did the GUI not appear. I upgraded vista ultimate with the upgrade disk but keeping nothing and then bought a new HD and an OEM windows pro when I did the oem installation I had the other HD's un plugged I don't know if that would make any difference.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    windows 8 pro
When you installed the second windows 8 did you disconnect the harddrive to your first windows 8??

When you install multiple windows OS they must all be connected for it to properly write the boot manager.

It can only write what it sees during installation, You should label your partitions so that you know which is which.

You can name them Windows 8 home & Windows 8 Work, etc.... so that when you have to do anything partition related such as installing a new OS you know which is which..

As ALLGAMES71 stated, easybcd will repair your boot, however the current version that ive seen will use the previous Win 7 text boot options menu, and not the pretty Win 8 gui, but other than that it will work exactly the same...
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8 & Windows 7 Dual Boot
    Computer type
    Laptop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    HP G60
    CPU
    AMD Turion RM-70 Dual Core 2.0 GHZ
    Memory
    3 GB
    Graphics Card(s)
    Nvidia GeForce 8200M G
    Screen Resolution
    1366 x 768
    Mouse
    MS Intellipoint 5 button (love it!)
    Browser
    Chrome and Chromium
    Antivirus
    Avast Free & Malwarebytes
Hi,Thanks for all your input. Downloaded EasyBCD and added the second Windows 8 to the boot. Now when I boot I have the choice windows 8 and Studio Windows 8. Outstanding.
As a by the way solved the DVD problem. I switched the SATA cable with a storage Hard drive and boom all drives and DVDs show up. Don't ask my why it worked I don't even want to know it just did.
Thanks again.
PP:thumbsup:
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    windows 8 pro
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