How to install Windows 8 as dual boot when 7 is already present.

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SeymourCray

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Nov 1, 2011
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OK here we go:

I have a big box i7-3960X - Rampage IV Extreme - has a 256GB SSD with Win 7 on and two HDD for data 64GB memory etc - been running beautifully for over a year.

C, D and E (with F as DVD)

I added a second SSD 256GB earlier today and rebooted with a Win 8 Install DVD in place.

Booted from that DVD and installed Win 8 onto the new SSD.

Rebooted - Win 8 is fine.

However I see no option to dual boot - I can only get into Win 7 now by using BIOS to alter boot order (or by disconnecting the new Win 8 SSD).

I see no dual-boot menu or options whether I boot Win 7 or Win 8.

Also the advanced system settings in both Win 7 and Win 8 show only themselves as the OS to select in the "Default Operating System" dropdown list.

Perhaps I should install Win 8 again onto the new SSD from within Win 7?

Its been years since I fiddled with dual boot (Win 2000 days) so I'm rusty as hell.

Also seeing messages (not error messages) and references to EFI and UEFI etc - saw none of this though when I installed Win 7 onto here about a year ago.

Finally when I began to install Win 8 it said the OS could not be installed on any of the selected drives (EFI and GPT were mentioned) but it allowed me to press 'Next' and apparently had no probs after that.

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I have just updated the Rampage Extreme's BIOS to latest version (it was very old - using older .ROM format).

I'm willing to start this all over again if anyone can advise - as I say I have Win 7 (installed ages ago with original old BIOS) already and now want to install Win 8 on the other SSD and just get a dual boot menu - why is this so hard?

Thx
 
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SeymourCray

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Sadly I tried that also and it didnt solve the problem - I ran this from within Win 7, added an entry for the Win8 drive and then rebooted. I saw the two OS options, selected Win 8 at which point it complained the signature of winload.exe could not be verified.

I manually booted into Win 8 (that is using BIOS options) and it booted fine - so the BCD solution isn't behaving intuitively.

Seymour
 
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SeymourCray

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Nov 1, 2011
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Thanks for this info - I was beginning to go around in circles - mainly because I did not want to lose the Win 7 installation else I could have experimented.

I had no idea one could install Win 8 from that "Sources" folder either - the whole setup is weird - user's should be given the option of upgrading or not - haviong two separate setup.exe files with almost zero information about EXACTLY what they do is poor I think.

Anyway all running fine - I boot and get the new Win 8 boot selector etc - seems fine - one odd thing is that if I restart I get the BIOS POST msgs etc then I eventually see the Win 8 boot menu - then if I select Win 7 it seems to restart and go through the BIOS POST again before finally starting Win 7.

This therefore takes a bit of time - last time I used multiboot (probably with Win 2000 and Win XP) the hardware would boot, I'd see the boot menu, select my OS and then that OS would begin to boot - was quite a bit faster overall...(assuming hardware is the same in each scenario).

Thanks again!

SC

 
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