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Before I recently upgraded my Ubuntu OS, I had a multiboot with Windows 7, Windows XP and Ubuntu.

When I started the computer, the GRUB bootloader would usually show the options: Windows 7 and Ubuntu (including memtest,...) When I then chose the Windows 7 option, the Windows bootloader showed up giving me two options: Windows 7 and Earlier version of Windows (=Windows XP).

After installing the latest version of Ubuntu, GRUB still recognized the Windows OS and I was able to start the Windows 7 bootloader as I always did, but when I chose the option to start Windows 7 in the Windows bootloader, this error message came up: 

Windows Boot Manager  

Windows failed to start. A recent hardware or software change might be the cause.  
To fix the problem:

  1. Insert your Windows installation disc and restart your computer. 
  2. Choose your language settings, and then click "Next."
  3. Click "repair your computer."

If you don't have this disc, contact your system administrator or computer
manufacturer for assistance. 

  Status: 0xc000000e

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

I can still get to the Windows 7/XP partitions from Ubuntu and I've seen that there are no missing files : ntldr, boot.ini, etc. are all still present and aren't corrupt (I've replaced them with files that I found online on some tutorials) this are all the files in the root directory on the XP partition:

Files in the root directory on the Windows XP partition

I've got no idea how to fix this, even after searching for a long time online, and I can't install Windows because I can't find the installation disk anymore).

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  • There exists a question on this very website which indicates where you can get Windows 7 installation disk which you will need to repair the Windows 7 bootloader
    – Ramhound
    May 1, 2014 at 15:18

1 Answer 1

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First of all I strongly recommend to backup your whole disk using Redo Backup or any other reliable backup software you choose.

In order to fix startup of your Windows 7 you should obtain a Windows 7 Recovery CD. Microsoft provides one here if you do not have one.

After you have got this CD burned;

  1. Boot from that CD.
  2. Select Startup Repair.

Your computer may restart for a few times.

If this can't solve your problem:

  1. Boot from that CD.
  2. Select Command Prompt.

  3. Use following commands:

    • bootrec.exe /fixmbr
    • bootrec.exe /fixboot
    • bootrec.exe /rebuildbcd

Try to reboot.

If the issue persist, using gparted try to delete Ubuntu and XP partitions and make Windows 7 partition the only one, occupying the whole disk and which is set "primary", "not hidden" and "active", again using gparted.

Then try the above methods again.

If all of these methods fail you can restore your backup image using Redo Backup any time you want, so you don't have anything to lose.

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  • Thanks! - Just about the link you provided for the windows 7 recovery disk, it isn't the right one; it's some kind of bootable disk to install a few KB<...> updates on windows. But I managed to burn a win 7 recovery cd from another windows 7 computer and that fixed the problem!
    – user319692
    May 5, 2014 at 14:29

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