Dual boot? or not?

[Rogert]

Before I had just a WD120 gig HD that was/is a 5400 rpm drive. I added a new
WD160 gig HD at 7200 rpm. I was/am running XP Home and wanted to keep data
and OS seperate on the old and new HD, copy, at my leisure all the data I
wanted to keep from the old to the new HD -THEN- "wipe" the old and use it
simply as an archive storage drive. Western Digital support directed me to
use master/slave configuration. Fine but that just combined the 2 drive,
essentially into 1 280 gig drive w/1 XP os. I had files I wanted stuff from
but didn't want to inherit all the settings, adware, bulls%^t etc. I wanted
to use some settings on some programs and not some on others. Now it's kinda
all in the same "mess"
My question is; is it too late to change configurations, whatever to go to
the type of setup I wanted in the first place?
In other words go to the configuration that will allow me to boot from
either drive I want to, copy selective data back and forth then in the end
keep the second HD as just an archive/storage drive? Still seperate from the
new 160 gig primary drive?
Any help here would be greatly appreciated.

 

[george]

first off, "master/slave configuration" really only has to do with the way
the drives are technically 'hooked' (and configured) together in the system.
It has nothing to do with what and how many OS'ses you intend to put on
them.
Now back to your Q.
You can, if you want/need install an os on each hd.
that would certainly allow you keep certain settings for certain programs.
However, I don't see the need for that, since you could very well have those
same settings (configured automatically/manyally) for the particular program
once it's installed in the new situation.
If you definitely want to have the os installed twice, make sure you are OK
as far as licensing goes.
Also if you have two boot-options (old os / new os) and you install an
application in both, you need to decide if the application goes into the
same directory/folder or not.
Suppose you have the app installed in the same directory (accessible from
both os'ses) then decide to make configuration changes to it while running
old os, those changes will (or will *not*) show up when running new os. It
could also mean app has trouble running in new os because things have
changed while in old os, that will never show up in new os registry eg.
I'd suggest go with the following setup:
drive 1 = OS and installed apps
drive 2 = DATA folders
This will likely mean you having to document the settings you want to keep
for specific apps, reinstall (configure) them in the new situation,
temporarily back up all your data from the respective discs, delete data
folderstructures from disk 1, format disk 2, restore all datafolers to disc
2.

hth