Dual Boot, Windows 7 and Lion with Unibeast, Working!

[berad82]

I am STILL having trouble after setting up Chimera via Multibeast because windows errors out of Chimera. I don't see a way around this with what I have tried. What is your active partition to first load? Also, have you seen windows error for:

"Status 0xc000000e

Info: The boot selection failed because a required device is inaccessible."

????

Also tried Chameleon on the EFI and had same windows issue. Can anyone recommend a way through this?

Does it matter which partition you use for W7 vs Lion?

 

[Going Bald]

I am STILL having trouble after setting up Chimera via Multibeast because windows errors out of Chimera. I don't see a way around this with what I have tried. What is your active partition to first load? Also, have you seen windows error for:

"Status 0xc000000e

Info: The boot selection failed because a required device is inaccessible."

????

Also tried Chameleon on the EFI and had same windows issue. Can anyone recommend a way through this?

Does it matter which partition you use for W7 vs Lion?

The only restriction on the partition you install Win7 is that it must be one of the first 4 unless you create a dynamic disc. I have successfully installed a win7/OS X dual boot with Win7 on the first, second and third partitions. Never tried with the fourth.

 

[SHPMac]

Berad. I'm not sure if it makes a difference or not. I partitioned my SSD with Unibeast (using the Mac OS disk utility). Partition 1 is the EFI. Partition 2 is Lion. Partition 2 is a very small partition. Then there is a small amount of unallocated space (128mb). Finally, Partition 3 is Windows 7. IOW: I've only installed W7 on the fourth partition.

I did have an instance when I found I could not boot into W7. (I'm still not sure what happened). However, when I was trying to restore a working image of the drive I tried an image that, for some reason, was missing the unallocated space between Lion and Window 7. The computer would not boot. I then used an image that contained the three partitions with the unallocated space I described above and everything worked.

As far as a way forward, if you (a) want the 2 OS's on your SSD and (b) have a working installation of Windows 7, you could try what I did. Make a working image of your W7 installation. Wipe your SSD (if it isn't already). Use Unibeast to get to the Mac OS disk utility and use that utility to create 2 partitions: 1 Mac OS Extended for Lion, 1 exFAT or FAT32 for Windows 7. Restore your W7 image to the partition you created for W7 (I reformatted it first to NTFS. I don't know if that is necessary or not.). Then use the Unibeast stick to install Lion on the partition you created for Lion. Then install MultiBeast including Chimera.

The only question I would have (and Going Bald may be able to answer it) is if your working Windows 7 installation has a "system reserved" partition. If so, it is my understanding that it contains the boot files for W7. I don't know if you can boot into W7 without those files somewhere. (In my case, I did my W7 installation without the system reserved partition.) Thus, if your W7 installation does have the SR partition, you may have to install it. I would think you could put it on a small partition between Lion and W7.

Good luck.

 

[berad82]

SHPMac, Thanks for the tips. I found a guide HERE for a tripple-boot with W7, OS X, & Ubuntu. I am going to give it a try as soon as I have time. It seems to specifically address the issue regarding the Windows 7 bootloader.

Fingers crossed.. will try your advice next after that.

 

[Going Bald]

SHPMac, Thanks for the tips. I found a guide HERE for a tripple-boot with W7, OS X, & Ubuntu. I am going to give it a try as soon as I have time. It seems to specifically address the issue regarding the Windows 7 bootloader.

Fingers crossed.. will try your advice next after that.

If you are installing Win7 on the same HDD as OS X and Ubuntu, then the Win7 partition is preformatted to FAT32. You will need to reformat it NTFS with the Win7 installer, but you don't need to worry about the System Reserved partition because preformatting the drive prevents its creation. All boot files are installed in Win7 root. I did a step-by-step guide some time ago - see viewtopic.php?f=81&t=20872 for SL, but it works for Lion also. Just substitute Lion for SL and UniBeast for iBoot and SL retail install disc.
Note: you can, if you want, install Win7 on the first partition instead of OS X. Just use the OS X installer to format the drive with partition 1 as MSDOS FAT and the second Mac OS Extended (Journaled) (instead of the other way around) and leave the rest free space. Then either exit the installer and install Win7 first or go ahead and install OS X and then install Win7.
Don't forget that Grub booter for Ubuntu must be installed in root and not to HDD MBR
and that you need to run gptsynch from terminal in Ubuntu.

 

[SHPMac]

SHPMac, Thanks for the tips. I found a guide HERE for a tripple-boot with W7, OS X, & Ubuntu. I am going to give it a try as soon as I have time. It seems to specifically address the issue regarding the Windows 7 bootloader.

Fingers crossed.. will try your advice next after that.

Awesome. Good luck. I'm thinking of adding Linux (Ubuntu) to my scheme. Heck, I actually thinking of adding Windows 8 beta (or whatever they're calling it) as well. But, if I do that, I'll set everything up on a different drive.

 

[berad82]

Going bald, Thanks for your posts regarding my bootloader issues. To dictate that grub be installed in the root folder do I simply create a /root partition prior to running install or is there more to it??

 

[Going Bald]

Going bald, Thanks for your posts regarding my bootloader issues. To dictate that grub be installed in the root folder do I simply create a /root partition prior to running install or is there more to it??

If you look at step 3p in the guide you will see a pic of that step - Ubuntu install wants you to select where to put grub - the /dev/sda4 is the root ( / ) of Ubuntu in that pic.
You can, if you want, create a small partition /boot while you are setting your partitions up and choose to install grub there if you want to keep it out of root ( / ).

 

[berad82]

Thanks you guys. Seems I am up and running now. I am SO excited!

Going Bald, your guide was very helpful.