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NeoTwinkie · 03:20 PM

Installing the latest Parallels beta screwed up my boot.ini file and now Windows won't start properly. Can anyone tell me what the contents of the boot.ini file from a standard Boot Camp installation are?

TheMosco · Apr 1, 2007, 02:08 PM

Does anyone have this? My boot.ini got messed up

NeoTwinkie · Apr 1, 2007, 02:22 PM

A friend sent me his, but at least in my particular situation it didn't really help the problem, and I ended up having to wipe and reinstall Windows. Sorry.

TheMosco · Apr 1, 2007, 04:39 PM

Can you post one. I don't even have one, so its not like its going to hurt.

ghporter · Apr 1, 2007, 05:15 PM

Boot from the XP install CD and enter the Recovery Console. Once in the Console (it's a command line interface) use the "fixboot" command. This rebuilds a correct boot.ini file in the appropriate location.

More Recovery Console info from the source.

NeoTwinkie · Apr 2, 2007, 01:57 AM

here's the contents of mine from my current install (it's just a plain text file, you can make a file called "boot.ini" in TextEdit and paste it in, and save it as plain text).

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(3)\WINDOW S
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(3)\WINDOWS="Micro soft Windows XP Professional" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect

TheMosco · Apr 2, 2007, 04:25 AM

Originally Posted by ghporter

Boot from the XP install CD and enter the Recovery Console. Once in the Console (it's a command line interface) use the "fixboot" command. This rebuilds a correct boot.ini file in the appropriate location.

More Recovery Console info from the source.

I am in london and will be for the next 4 weeks (and have been here for 3) so I don't have my cd. Thats why I am scrambling trying to figure this out.

Thanks NeoTwinkie, I will see if that works. I have feeling it wont. For some reason i have no keyboard and mouse in bootcamp.

ghporter · Apr 2, 2007, 07:21 AM

Try this:

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(3)\WINDOW S
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(3)\WINDOWS="Micro soft Windows XP Professional" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect

That's directly from my Boot Camp installation. This is a plain text file with the ".ini" extension, nothing more. You can create it with any text editor.

Note the item on line 3: the "partition(3)" is critical because it specifically identifies which partition on the identified drive is the boot source. This numbering is NOT "zero based": the first partition is #1, the second is #2, and the third is #3...

There is no guarantee that your machine's drive is partitioned the same way mine is, so proceed with caution and don't be terribly surprised if you have to play with it a little to get the right partition identified.

TheMosco · Apr 2, 2007, 06:29 PM

yeah, that didn't work. It boots but I still don't have keyboard and mouse support. Even the usb mouse doesn't get power. Crashing parallels really messed bootcamp up. Parallels still works though.

AC Rempt · Apr 3, 2007, 12:37 AM

I had the same problem, and in the end, I had to reinstall Windows. The Recovery Console didn't help me, but then, I sure I wasn't using it properly. Frickin' command line!

ghporter · Apr 3, 2007, 07:07 AM

I keep that link I posted above handy so I can refer to the instructions whenever I might need the Recovery Console. It's almost but not totally like the Command Prompt app, but the differences are important, thus a need for a reference. Maybe I should just print a handy reference card and file that somewhere handy...

In any case, the substitute boot.ini file not working is not unexpected. The "fixmbr" command, another one available from RC, actually rewrites the master boot record on an MBR-type partition like the Boot Camp partition. That would be the next step to take, but lacking the CD, you're pretty much stuck.

AC Rempt · Apr 3, 2007, 12:22 PM

Not to be a jerk, but all of this reminds me why I love OS X.

ghporter · Apr 3, 2007, 05:21 PM

Originally Posted by AC Rempt

Not to be a jerk, but all of this reminds me why I love OS X.

It's just a different design philosophy, and of course a different boot-base system. Windows is interconnected while OS X is intermeshed, so one file going fubar won't wreck (usually) a whole OS X installation. Windows uses a large variety of different programs to do a large variety of tasks, and coordinating among and between them gets complicated. Unfortunately this makes Windows subject to being fubared by one fubared file.

The booting issue though is something that could potentially happen in OS X. If there's an inappropriate write to the wrong spot on the drive, then the boot information can be scrambled, even in OS X. But since OS X doesn't diddle with that except when booting, it's pretty safe. That's also true for Windows, except where we're talking about using Parallels and Boot Camp together, since Parallels looks at the boot information in the Boot Camp partition when it starts a Boot Camp-based VM. The convenience of copy and paste access to Windows apps from an OS X desktop is balanced by the fact that the tool that lets us do that can hose the Windows installation.