vista and xp dual boot

[Guest]

ok,, i have installed xp sp2 32 bit onto a sata h/drive. its run perfect, i
then install vista 64 bit onto another sata hard drive,, (not a partition,,
another sata drive) vista now runs perfect, when i go to my computer, i can
see all drives and access all files in xp from vista,, but once ive
installed vista i can only boot to vista
How do i set up my system so i can boot to xp or vista,, it would be great
if i could boot to one or other,, IE have a choice,, ive tried for weeks to
achieve this for various reasons.
ie my games run faster in xp and my sli config works in xp. there are also
vista advantages too
hope some one has an answer for me
[email protected]

 

[housetrained]

press F8 after the beep

 

[John Barnes]

Download and install EasyBCD or VistaBootPro and add an entry for a legacy
os. If you still can't boot to XP from the new boot menu, then you will
have to copy the ntldr, ntdetect.com and boot.ini files from your XP drive
to the Vista drive and you may have to modify the boot.ini to point to where
your xp os is located.

 

[Timothy Daniels]

ok,, i have installed xp sp2 32 bit onto a sata h/drive. its run perfect, i
then install vista 64 bit onto another sata hard drive,, (not a partition,,
another sata drive) vista now runs perfect, when i go to my computer,
i can see all drives and access all files in xp from vista,, but once ive
installed vista i can only boot to vista
How do i set up my system so i can boot to xp or vista,, it would be
great if i could boot to one or other,, IE have a choice,, ive tried for
weeks to achieve this for various reasons. ie my games run faster in xp
and my sli config works in xp. there are also vista advantages too
hope some one has an answer for me

Was the drive with XP on it connected and powered up when you
installed Vista on the 2nd hard drive? The Vista installer should have
set up a dual-boot with XP if it could see the existing XP OS. If you
are willing to re-install Vista, you could try that scenario. (Installing
XP *after* Vista is installed will NOT give you a dual-boot between
the two OSes.) Otherwise, it's time for EasyBCD or VistaBoot Pro,
free 3rd-party utilities that are downloadable from the 'Net.

*TimDaniels*

 

[Guest]

im aware of f8,, but when i chose the drive where xp is installed i get a
black screen with disk error and boot failure, or something like that
thx john, but have you any other ideas

 

[Guest]

the xp drive was connected and when i installed vista i did it from ( boot
from cd /dvd rom settings in bios) i can only assume that xp could be seen
during install as i had the opption to choose to install vista on the same
drive as xp, i choose a different drive, will this third party software you
have spoke about let me set up dual boot opptions without re installing
windows, also i dont mind reinstalling xp and vista again as long as i can
get this dual boot thing working
it takes less than 1 hour to get both os installed on my sys, so not a long
task
thx for reply,, please reply again
D@VE T

 

[Dominic Payer]

Does your BIOS offer the option to choose the boot drive: usually you would
use F11 at the initial BIOS screen? You may need to disable the initial
"pretty" screen so you see the hardware details at boot time.

 

[Guest]

ok i have installed and run vista boot pro,, now when i reboot pc i get the
opption to start vista or xp,, vista is starting fine but xp opption fails
with a message to insert xp cd and run the repair opption. once in the repair
opption section, would you know what command to choose
many thanks timothy
[email protected]

 

[John Barnes]

Copy the files mentioned in my post, and change the boot.ini rdisk number
if necessary.
If you insist on doing it thru the repair command prompt, the best command
for you would be bootcfg /rebuild you would need to copy the ntldr and
ntdetect.com files from the cd to the system partition root.

 

[Guest]

ok john it sounds like you know what you are talking about,, you are further
advanced in this area than I
for me to carry out what you have written i would need a step by step 100%
guide
IE a walk through the whole process. im not thick just nat had any
involvement in this area before.. if you would be kind enough to guide me
assuming you have the time, It would be most appreciated
Remember at the moment im booting to vista on a sata drive.. my xp is on a
seprate sata drive wich is partitioned, xp is on e: drive,, ive renamed the
drive XP Drive (E) the other partition on this drive is a 40 gig area renamed
back up drive.
the opption to choose between vista or xp is visual on a boot up, but only
vista will boot,, if i choose the xp opption it fails
many thx once again
D@VE ...T

 

[John Barnes]

First check your XP drive for the 3 files mentioned. If there, copy them
onto the drive that is called 'system' in your Vista Drive Management. If
not there, on control panel, select system and maintenance, then type folder
in the search box, you will then have Folder options show up , click on it
and in View, uncheck the hide protected operating system files. Then go
back and find the files and copy them to the root of the system drive (no
folder) . You can then try to boot to XP. If you still have a problem,
open the boot.ini file (with notepad) and change the rdisk number to the
other number from your disk management. If it is currently 0, change to 1.
If 1, then 0. You only indicate two drives. This should work. If you
still have problems, please post back the exact information from Disk
Management. i.e. Disk 0, partition 1, CD system, boot, active, primary
partition, etc for each partition on each hard drive.

 

[Guest]

ok john
1 st ive found ntldr and ntdetect by searching the xp drive from my computer
within vista,, (remember i can not boot xp at the mo) there was 2 of each so
ive copied 1 off each into a folder i created in vista my docs (just to keep
them safe for now)
the boot ini file is not there
also,, call me stupid,, but where will i find vista drive management
i think we are slowly moving forward,,
Many many thx
[email protected]

 

[John Barnes]

First, start VistaBootPro and make sure the legacy os entry points to the
drive letter that shows up in my computer. Then if you need to change it,
try to boot again.

Disk Management: start/search type compu then select Computer Management
when it appears at the top. In Computer Management, Disk Management is in
the left column.