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I have two hard drives (win7 and win10), upon boot-up there were no "Choose an OS.." it automatically continues to win10. Both are working when the other one is unattached. Tried googling it but tutorials always tell to do Partition and install new OS.

Update: Is there a way to make boot always prompt the list of available OS so that I would not go into BIOS every time?

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3 Answers 3

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Here is a simple way.

  1. Insert both hard drives and find which hard drive the system boots into.
  2. The OS which gets booted will be managing the bootloader for the system
  3. Install EasyBCD (a free, easy to use software to manage your boot menu) You can download it from here: https://neosmart.net/EasyBCD/
  4. Open EasyBCD and choose 'Add a new entry'
  5. Choose the type of your operating system, specify the partition letter, and Save changes.

Restart your computer, and the next time you will see the bootmenu asking for which operating system to boot into.

Note: If your bootmenu time is set to zero, the boot menu might not show up, so increase that time, it can also be done in EasyBCD.

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So you have two hard drives, both have independent and bootable operating systems when connected individually?

The answer here is to use your system BIOS/UEFI utility, which exact details vary quite a bit based on the manufacturer and implementation, but generally one or both of these methods apply:

1) On demand selection - Most computer have a way of selecting the boot device on each startup, often called "Boot menu" or something similar, the exact key combination to bring up this menu varies but it is often ESC, F2, F9, F10 or similar. This should bring up a utility or boot menu allowing you to select a drive to boot from. This is a one-time setting and will revert to default on the next startup.

2) Changing the BIOS boot priority order - This is done inside the BIOS/UEFI settings of the computer, again this varies by manufacturer, but there should a boot order menu entry allowing you to select which devices to boot in what order. You would change this to the be the order you wish such as:

1) Optical Drive
2) USB Removable Drive
3) HDD 0
4) HDD 1
5) Network

and you would just change the order according to your need. It will search for a bootable device starting from the top and going down the list, you change this order as needed. This is persistent and survives a reboot.

Just a few references... there are literally hundred available on Google by searching "change boot order" or "select boot device" or similar terms. You could narrow it down further by adding your model of PC, such as "Asus m5a97 select boot device".

http://www.boot-disk.com/boot_priority.htm
http://www.howtogeek.com/129815/beginner-geek-how-to-change-the-boot-order-in-your-computers-bios/
https://www.lifewire.com/change-the-boot-order-in-bios-2624528

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One option is to use BIOS/UEFI boot menu to start system from one of the drives - this is selectable by user but needs to get into boot options at computer start.

Second option is to use software like:

https://www.plop.at/en/bootmanager/download.html

Which installed on external pendrive connected to computer can make you able to select which system to start. Then the pendrive should be always connected to computer and BIOS/UEFI should be set to start system from that pendrive.

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