Windows Vista do not boot after installing on Ubuntu external drive

Just for testing purpose I had downloaded Ubuntu on my system. This was a iso file. I do not want to install it directly so that use Unetbootin and installed the entire operating system on a usb drive. When I reboot the system I can see Ubuntu desktop. But again on restart the system freezes on verifying dmi pool data. It did not respond nor it moves ahead. I had not did any changes to my system. I have a 8 GB usb and last time I had created a bootable Windows XP partition out of it. The same was working fine. Only when I connect my usb the system boot on both Windows and Ubuntu or else it just freezes on the the pool data screen. I do not want to re-install windows. This is quiet important because I have some data in it. I am sure that the issue is not with my system, it might be due to some bios misconfiguration. What I can do to fix that instantly.

This looks that your bootloader is affected because of which the system freezes. The screen that you mentioned above freezes only if there is invalid bootloader or if there is any problem related to system hardware. But luckily windows has a tool called as Bootrec.exe. You just need to run this tool in Windows recovery environment to fix your bootloader issue. For that insert your Windows Vista bootable disc. Click on Repair your computer. This option located on the installation screen at the left end. Click on it. Now there are two ways here to fix the issue. First you can do that by using the commands and second by just clicking on Startup Repair. Click on Startup Repair. This will scan your system startup files and fix if any entries are missing. It will aslo rebuilt your bootloader file. If this does not work then the second option that you can go for is by command line utility. For that type Bootrec.exe and hit enter. Options like /FixMbr will help you to fix mbr related issues, /FixBoot will fix the boot, /ScanOs will find any additional OS in your system and /RebuildBcd will rebuild the bootloader.

Do one thing. Go in your bios and check that your usb drive is not kept as first boot device. You can find that in the bios integrated peripheral page or there would be a separate tag for boot. Go in that and set your hard drive as priority. Then restart.

When you are testing Ubuntu then the best thing to do that is by installing. It provides you option to install Ubuntu and Windows side by side. You can then remove that from your control panel. That would be much easier. You just need to insert the bootable cd and then run Startup Repair. All settings are simply restored. And if you are testing Ubuntu there is as LiveCD verison also. You can test that without installing it. Just boot from your usb drive and click on Try Ubunut. The entire desktop is loaded with all applications. It is fine to work on that for sometime. It also detects your lan and other settings automatically. I found this operating system has very flexible to use. And if still the system freeze on dmi pool data then there are chances that your hard drive is dying slowly. I had faced this issue last month on my old 80GB usb. It looks that it was working fine, but as time goes on the system started getting slower. At the end no device error found in dmi pool data screen.

I will not agree that this is a hardware fault. It can be due to poor installation or improper boot.ini file. You can rebuild that to fix the issue as mentioned in the second post.

Surely to boot from usb you had made changes in the boot order. That is where the issue lies. Change the boot order. And then go back again in the bios. If the boot order lies the same then the issue lies with bios. The bios is not saving your settings. There are two reason behind that. The first is the motherboard cmos battery needs as replacement and second is outdated bios. Insert your usb. Check that there is nothing install on it. Then start your system. IF the system boots then your usb is counted as hardware in your system. The bios tries to find the devices and only ofter the system boots up finally. This has happened to me in my old on which I use a external drive. I keep that connected forever. For 2 months I had even installed Windows on that, as my existing drive was on replacement. But later on when I boot on the internal drive the system freezes on dmi pool. After updating bios everything is working fine.

What I know that Ubuntu does not do any major changes to your system. So this thing must not appear. I will advice you to just boot in safe mode if possible and run a system restore.

System restore can do nothing here. The problem is the system stuck on verifying dmi pool data screen. The reason behind that is corrupt boot files. This is the first thing that you need to test by running a startup repair. Second your hard drive configuration is not proper in bios. Check that your internal drive is set on first boot device. Disable boot from external drive option. Save the settings, restart and then check back. Corrupt bios is also responsible for that. If you had faced this issue before also then you need a bios update. You can find that update on motherboard manufacturer site. Last thing that will recommend you is to check the connection in your system. It happens a number of time that due to loose connection such problem appears.

One thing that everyone has forget to mention here is about grub. Grub in Ubuntu's bootloader. When you had installed Ubuntu the grub has installed in your usb. Do not format the usb. You have to fix the bootloader.

It looks that your system is taking the usb as a system partition, because of which it is stucked on the dmi pool screen. For that the only option you have is to fixmbr. Run this command in recovery console. If nothing happens, boot in Ubuntu copy paste your data in other place and then re-install Vista. Next time when you are testing any of this operating system use LiveCD version instead of full installation. In LiveCD you boot from CD or usb and there is no need to interfere the bootloader.