Dual-boot with Win 98SE & XP

[Greg D.]

I'm currently running 98SE on a 40-Gig hard drive with multiple
partitions. I own Partition Magic 5 (with Boot Magic) and have 98SE
on my C: drive. My D: drive is empty (4 gigs), and my programs reside
on E:. All my partitions are FAT 32.

I have just purchased an XP-Home upgrade, and would like to install it
to the D: drive, allowing me to dual-boot between the two OS's. I have
my 98SE disk to prove ownership.

My question is this: Should I convert my D: drive to NTFS using PM5
before installing XP, or should I try to manually force it to the
existing FAT 32 D: drive? Do I need to use PM to make D: the active
drive before installing?

I'd naturally like the installation to be as easy as possible, along
with the dual-boot option when I fire up my system.

Most of the posts I looked at regarding dual-boot systems seemed to be
the opposite of my question (already have XP; want to add 98SE, etc.).

Many thanks for any help on this question.

Greg D.

 

[Guest]

Hi,

Read this article about dual booting between 98 and XP.

http://www.winxpsolution.com/DualBootingXPPro.aspx

Regarding the decsion about going for NTFS here is my recommendation.

If you are going for a upgrade to NTFS then you will not be abl to access that folder from 98 so you need to think before you go for that option.

And you do not need PM to do the upgrade of FAT to NTFS. XP will prompt you before installing that and you can decide whether you want to do that.

And finally remember that the process of converting from FAT to NTFS is non reversible.

 

[Tim]

Greg,

I am going to overlook one question: Can you do a new install of XP into a
new partition even though you have Win98 on an existing partition IE do you
have to do an Over the Top install?

If you inserted the XP cd and went to install (then ignoring the above) you
would be presented with a list of partitions you could install on one of
which would be D (ignoring the above). If you installed in D your system
would be instantly a Multi Boot configuration presenting a choice at startup
of Win98 and XP. The XP install detects the Win98, sees C drive is Active
and the current Boot partition so puts the boot.ini and boot loader in
there. Depending on the answer you give boot loader, it continues either on
C or D.

During the XP install you will be give the option and facility to do what
you like with D partition - leave it as FAT32, reformat as FAT32, format as
NTFS. So, its your choice. Just be careful to not reformat your existing C
partition - perhaps give it a nice label before you start the process (I did
that once, you do it only once).

I always recommend NTFS for XP (and 2000, nt4 etc) as it is a much more
resilient file system with the ability to automatically recover after power
outages. NTFS also supports Security, Compressed folders, and Encrypted
folders along with reparse points and other new fangled facilities - some XP
/ NT services will not install unless you have NTFS. NTFS is good. FAT of
any type is not good. Obviously if you use FAT for the XP partition, Windows
98 will be able to read or write its contents, with NTFS Win98 Can't - this
is the *only* situation where FAT (8, 16, or 32) is excusable...

4GB for XP is TINY. It will fit with some room to spare, but that won't last
long. Don't for a moment think you can reinstall your current apps back into
C drive while running XP.... this will poop over both XP and Win98 as even
though System files go into System, you will invariably have different patch
levels and versions for products on different OS.

I recommend that you invest some dosh in a new drive and give yourself a
minimum of say 8GB (if not 16 or 32GB) for XP sytem drive. XP will run
better for it - 40GB drives are not as well performing as the more recent 80
or 120 GB drives (things date so quickly) - there are plenty of bargains
around too. Remember that the swap file will by default by 1.5 x RAM size,
so if you have 256MB Ram, thats 384 MB that is going to disappear on you and
in a 4GB drive thats a lot.

HTH
- Tim

 

[Greg D.]

Thanks for the info, Tim. I haven't yet run the XP CD, as I wanted to
get as much information as possible before doing so. I believe I will
take your advice and have XP set up the D: partition as NTFS and
install the dual boot loader.

Money is a little tight now (when isn't it?), so I'm going to stick
with my 40 Gig hard drive for the time being. Since I do have
Partition Magic 5, and I do have empty space on the drive, I can
certainly enlarge the D: partition (I think I'll bump it up initially
to 8 gigs).

I have all my programs on my E: partition. I have done this because
if my OS goes wacky, and I have to do a fresh install, I don't lose my
programs or data.

Thanks again for the great advice. I appreciate it.

Greg D.