[James_A]

It makes it number 2, because C is not 0, it's 1.

In the strange world of ARC syntax used in BOOT.INI:
multi(X), disk(0), rdisk(Y) & partition(Z)
X and Y begin at 0, but Z begins at 1
if the first word is "multi" then "disk" is always disk(0)

So, multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1) is the first partition of the first physical disk on the first disk controller.

[Meados]

damm.. This is amazing.. I also tried this and seems my windows 2000 is so faster how is windows xp boot.

Can someone send me the windows 2003 boot files? I would like to check the speed in windows 2000.

[Dave-H]

Meados I've sent you a PM with links to my Windows 2003 startup files.
I just wish they worked for me!


Jacobmax, thanks for the feedback.
Are you saying that the entries in my boot.ini file do match my drive configuration?
If so, we still don't know why these newer startup files won't work on my system.
Ninho?

[Meados]

Dave-H, on Sep 8 2008, 12:36 PM, said:

Meados I've sent you a PM with links to my Windows 2003 startup files.
I just wish they worked for me!

They work like a charm for me! And my language of windows is different.

It runs more faster than Windows XP ones. Seems my Windows 2000 startup is with same speed of Windows XP startup, or at least its very close. (I will do time count to see the perfomance of both boottimes)

I also tried to bot Windows XP with windows 2003 files, but I didn't noted any difference.

[James_A]

Dave-H, on Sep 8 2008, 12:36 PM, said:

Are you saying that the entries in my boot.ini file do match my drive configuration?

Yes, to me it seems fine. Remembering that, according to Microsoft:
Your boot files are on your system volume -- and
Your system files are on your boot volume

then you have NTLDR+NTDETECT.COM+BOOT.INI on C:
and you have your Windows 2000 system on D:\WIN-NT

according to my reading of both your screenshot and your BOOT.INI.

Your screenshot also shows C: as a primary partition and D: as a logical partition which fully occupies an extended partition (See the green border around it in the screenshot.)

I have been following this thread with a view to trying this myself, so I am *very* interested in what makes this work and what doesn't.

The only thing I can think of is that your D: being in a logical partition, is in a slightly different place than if it were a primary partition. The two used to be exactly 63 sectors different when disks were a lot smaller and everything was ruled by CHS (Cylinder-Head-Sector) geometry.

Microsoft used to advise against multiple primary partions that were readable by DOS because (IIRC) it led to DOS confusion and possible data loss. On the other hand Windows 2000 is perfectly happy with more than one Win-readable primary partition (and I've done it).

The Win2000 NTLDR is parsing the MBR, finding the extended partition and then following the partition "chain" down the disk until it finds the logical partition. Is it possible that the WinXP NTLDR no longer does this? In other words does the WinXP NTLDR require both system volume AND boot volume to be primary partitions?

That would account for the Win2000 NTLDR working and the WinXP NTLDR not. Does anyone else know for sure?

[Meados]

Ok where's my test of speed of booting.
It's in same machine. However Windows XP is almost a clean install and Windows 2000 e full of programs.. About 76 in start menu.. (I don't believe that thsi affect boot time, but it's for you know)

Windows 2000
W/ XP
40 s

Windows XP
20 s

Windows 2000
W/ 2003
38 s

Windows XP
W/ 2003
20 s

So seems its about 2 seconds more fast booting Windows 2000 with Windows 2003 files. Windows XP with windows 2003 files I didn't noticed any difference. :|

I don't have the original Windows 2000 files, so if someone want to send them to me, so I can test the speed with normal booting to compare with Windows 2003 and XP version would be nice.

[Dave-H]

Hi Meados,
My Windows 2000 files are now uploaded where you found the Windows 2003 ones!
Let us know how fast the boot is with them.
Dave.

[Ascii2]

Meados, on Sep 8 2008, 06:03 PM, said:

I don't have the original Windows 2000 files, so if someone want to send them to me, so I can test the speed with normal booting to compare with Windows 2003 and XP version would be nice.

I have attached an archive with the original ntldr and NTDETECT.COM files from a Windows 2000 Professional with Service Pack 4 installation.

This post has been edited by Yzöwl: 09 August 2011 - 06:47 AM
Reason for edit: Attachment Removed, (non-reditributable files)

[Meados]

Ok, I have tried with original ones of Ascii2 wheres the results:

Windows 2000
Original Files
42 s

Windows XP
W/ 2000
Didn't boot

Final Results:

Windows 2000
Original Files
42 s

Windows XP
W/ 2000
Didn't boot

Windows 2000
W/ XP
40 s

Windows XP
20 s

Windows 2000
W/ 2003
38 s

Windows XP
W/ 2003
20 s

Please not that this can have some inaccuracy.

[Meados]

I also decreased the boot time in 2 second with 2 tips of this tutorial:

http://www.johntp.com/2006/02/15/improve-w...-xp-boot-speed/

Maybe is possible to decrease more replacing other windows files.

[Dave-H]

This is fascinating stuff, and it looks from Meados' findings that it's well worth doing.
I still can't resolve the problem with my system though.

JacobMax suggested earlier that it may be because my Windows 2000 drive is not on a primary disk partition.
I have only ever used fdisk to partition my drives, which will not allow more than one primary partition on a physical drive.

I realise that there are many other partition management programs out there, so could someone recommend one (ideally free!) that will allow me to make my D: drive into a primary partition, instead of a logical volume within a secondary partition as it is now.

At least then I can eliminate that as being the possible problem why the Windows XP and 2003 boot files won't work on my system.

I can boot into Windows 98 and backup my Windows 2000 (D:\WIN-NT) system files folder onto another drive, so if the original gets lost by changing the status of the D: partition it won't matter.
The critical thing is that the new second primary partition must still be drive D:, and even more vital, the operation must on no account jeopardise the data which is on drive C:, or I will be deep in the brown stuff!

Any suggestions gratefully received.
Dave.

[Ninho]

Dave-H, on Sep 11 2008, 02:06 PM, said:

This is fascinating stuff, and it looks from Meados' findings that it's well worth doing.
I still can't resolve the problem with my system though.

I realise that there are many other partition management programs out there, so could someone recommend one (ideally free!) that will allow me to make my D: drive into a primary partition, instead of a logical volume within a secondary partition as it is now.

Hi again, Dave! Sorry I didn't come back to you again earlier, have been away.
Reading the whole thread again, concurr with James that source of your trouble maybe the NT loaders from XP and 2003 no longer booting from a secondary, while 2k had no problem with it. It would be a strange regression, but quite possible with Microsoft software.

My recommendation of partition mgmt software : Ranish. You'll need to learn and practice some however before you touch your disk. In any event backup, backup, backup ! Ranish partition manager has an active and helpful support group hosted at Yahoo groups. Oh, did I tell you it's free ?

[James_A]

I think I know why this:

Meados, on Sep 11 2008, 10:36 AM, said:

...

Windows XP
W/ 2000
Didn't boot

...

has happened.

It's because the Windows 2000 version of NTLDR needs two additional files:
arcldr.exe and arcsetup.exe.



I now have a second theory why Dave's system won't work. Sometimes the boot sector in a logical partition has an incorrect value for the "hidden sectors". This value should be the number of sectors from the start of the disk to the boot sector, but is often only 63, which is the number of sectors to the last partition table.

Again, to use Ninho's phrase, this would point to a regression from the Windows 2000 NTLDR to the Windows XP NTLDR. As with my last theory, I don't know for sure.

The good news is that if D: is changed from a logical partition to a primary primary then Windows 2000 should still keep the same drive letters. The reason it is D: to start with, is that there are NO primary partitions on any other drives (see the screenshot posted above).

What I don't know is whether Windows 98 will recognize a second primary partition at all, or maybe ignore it. Information around the Internet seems a bit vague about this and my old, old PartitionMagic manual has conflicting information on different pages.

[Ninho]

James_A, on Sep 13 2008, 06:49 PM, said:

What I don't know is whether Windows 98 will recognize a second primary partition at all, or maybe ignore it. Information around the Internet seems a bit vague about this and my old, old PartitionMagic manual has conflicting information on different pages.

I can answer this last point : Win 98 will recognise several primaries and assign them letters, as long as they are partition types that it knows, i.e. any flavour of FAT. It won't touch an NTFS (of course), but it is smart enough to "skip over" one and look for other DOS/Win partitions. There are certain bugs in DOS 7's IO.SYS partition enumeration code and letter assignment, only in certain cases where there exist also non-MS partitions, which is not a concern for the OP, I think.

[Dave-H]

Sorry for the delay in replying everyone, I've been away.
Interesting the two files that James_A mentions.
Neither of those two files are on my system except in the WIN-NT\ServicePackFiles\i386 folder.
I tried copying them to C:\ to see if that was in fact the cause of my problem, but it made no difference.

It would have been great if it had been that simple!

I will have to bite the bullet and experiment with disk partition managers, to see if I can convert that D: drive to a primary partition, preferably without losing everything.
I will be doing backups first of course!

[James_A]

I have read your post twice to make sure, but:

Dave-H, on Sep 17 2008, 12:12 AM, said:

... Neither of those two files are on my system except in the WIN-NT\ServicePackFiles\i386 folder. ...

really surprises me.

Are you able to acquire an old version of PartitionMagic? This program, written by PowerQuest some years ago could do this partition conversion with ease without data loss. I used to use version 6.0 which handled Windows 2000 NTFS partitions as well, but not those created by Windows XP.

I now use a free LiveCD with GParted on it, but must warn you that I once lost all the data on a FAT32 partition because of an error. Maybe the error was part GParted and partly my misunderstanding of an on-screen message, but I still hesitate in recommending it.

PartitionMagic, incidentally, seems to be one of a long list of programs which Symantec have effectively killed-off by acquisition.

This post has been edited by James_A: 17 September 2008 - 01:54 AM

[Ninho]

James_A, on Sep 13 2008, 06:49 PM, said:

... because the Windows 2000 version of NTLDR needs two additional files:
arcldr.exe and arcsetup.exe.

Hmmm... those 2 are used for SCSI disks I believe. Definately not used for booting from IDE !

--
Ninho

[Ascii2]

Ninho, on Sep 17 2008, 01:28 PM, said:

James_A, on Sep 13 2008, 06:49 PM, said:

... because the Windows 2000 version of NTLDR needs two additional files:
arcldr.exe and arcsetup.exe.

Hmmm... those 2 are used for SCSI disks I believe. Definately not used for booting from IDE !

--
Ninho

arcsetup.exe and arcldr.exe do appear to be required. I would attach the archive with all ntldr, NTDETECT.COM, arcsetup.exe, and arcldr.exe; but MSFN.org forums seems to limit attachment size to 200K (attachment would be like 303 KB).

I think arcsetup.exe and arcldr.exe have something to do with ARC paths.

EDIT: For SCSI, Ntbootdd.sys is often used. By default, Ntbootdd.sys is not installed when not necessary.

This post has been edited by Ascii2: 19 September 2008 - 05:46 PM

[Meados]

Ascii2, on Sep 19 2008, 06:28 PM, said:

arcsetup.exe and arcldr.exe do appear to be required. I would attach the archive with all ntldr, NTDETECT.COM, arcsetup.exe, and arcldr.exe; but MSFN.org forums seems to limit attachment size to 200K (attachment would be like 303 KB).

I think arcsetup.exe and arcldr.exe have something to do with ARC paths.

For SCSI, Ntbootdd.sys is used. By default, Ntbootdd.sys is not installed when not necessary.

I have that files, I can do the test of windows xp with windows 2000 boot files if you want.

[Ascii2]

Meados, on Sep 19 2008, 04:33 PM, said:

I have that files, I can do the test of windows xp with windows 2000 boot files if you want.

I would like the test performed. The change in boot time should be interesting.