Dual Booting Windows XP

[Less Than 0]

Alright, I have a simple problem. Well probably not so simple since i
cant seem to figure it out. I have XP Images. I want to put more than
one on a hard drive. I then want to be able to choose which one boots
when i start the computer. I apply the first image. Use Partition
Magic 7 to resize it to about 10 gigs. Then i use PM7 to create
another primary partition. I apply the second image. Goes on great.
But i can only boot to the first image. I have read that you have to
have both your OS's below 8GB to be bootable so i am going to try
this next. If it works then i suppose my problem is solved. So my
question is, is there a way around this? What was the point of saying
you can create 4 primary partitions, yet you cant boot from them past
8GB? Seems like a waste to me, especially with the size of drives now
days. Any help would be appreciated.

 

[Pegasus \(MVP\)]

Alright, I have a simple problem. Well probably not so simple since i
cant seem to figure it out. I have XP Images. I want to put more than
one on a hard drive. I then want to be able to choose which one boots
when i start the computer. I apply the first image. Use Partition
Magic 7 to resize it to about 10 gigs. Then i use PM7 to create
another primary partition. I apply the second image. Goes on great.
But i can only boot to the first image. I have read that you have to
have both your OS's below 8GB to be bootable so i am going to try
this next. If it works then i suppose my problem is solved. So my
question is, is there a way around this? What was the point of saying
you can create 4 primary partitions, yet you cant boot from them past
8GB? Seems like a waste to me, especially with the size of drives now
days. Any help would be appreciated.

Consider using XOSL as a boot manager. It has a nice graphical
user interface, it is free, and it will let you boot into any partition
(primary or logical) on any disk (master or slave), regardless of
the location (above or below 8 GBytes).

 

[Jim]

RE: XOSL, the only issue I have w/ this product is that it has not been very
well supported over the past few years, last time I checked, it hadn't been
updated in several years (its not even hosting by http://www.xosl.org
anymore, its long time home). Don't get me wrong, I've used it the past, it
worked fine last time I used it (circa 2000), but this is one caveat that
would concern me.

My preference is BootIt NG ( http://www.bootitng.com ). This is very well
supported, continually updated and enhanced, has its own NGs, provides
partition management and imaging too. I was a prior user of Partition
Manager and Drive Image, which I've since replaced w/ BootIt NG (about 4
years ago). Just no need for these other tools anynore (for me anyway).

As far as the primaries issues, you have to realize that these VERY large
HDs are a relatively recent phenomenon, certainly far more recent than the
semantics that rule the DOS-based geometry of your HD. I also believe the
use of additional primaries wasn't to support multi-booting, initially, but
simply finer control over partitioning for a single OS. IOW, multi-booting
issues/concerns/limitations became what they are because these were
afterthoughts (afterall, the first time I can even recall multi-booting an
MS OS was Win 3.11 and the then-new NT 3.1 around 1993, again, well after
the all these semantics were well in place).

FYI, I have had no problems booting XP from numerous locations on the HD, as
yet, I've found no restrictions on where it can be loaded from. It seems
whatever restrictions that preceeded it w/ Win98, WinNT, etc., have been
eliminated or at least are much less stringent. I've cloned my installation
numerous times and booted w/o problems, and while I didn't test *every*
possible HD location, I have been up and down my 120GB HD considerably. So
I don't think you'll have any real issues here as far as XP. If you want to
multi-boot Win98, WinNT, etc, as well, then yes, place these near the head
of the HD, the older, the closer to the head they should be for maximum
compatibility.

One additional feature of BootIt NG I love is "unlimited primaries". This
makes it possible to have (essentially) unlimited clones of your OS! I
don't even use an extended partition (w/ logical partitions) anymore because
of this feature. You are still restricted to four primaries (or three
primaries + 1 extended partition) at *runtime*, but for definitional
purposes, the restriction is lifted, I typically have 15-20 partitions
defined on my HD at any given moment, including MS-DOS 6.22, MS-DOS 7.1,
Win98, XP, W2K, several XP snapshots (images made w/ BootItNG), several DATA
partitions, etc. And all the OS's load as C:, which avoids a ton of
problems compared to the MS boot loader (makes cloning a trival exercise).
Works great.

HTH

Jim

 

[Pegasus \(MVP\)]

XOSL is a free product and is therefore not supported. However,
it has its own highly responsive newsgroup.

About its updates (or otherwise): XOSL seems to offer all the
facilities you could want for a boot manager, beating many
other products by a long shot, so why update it?

About BootIT: Can it boot into a WinXP installation that
resides in a logical drive, complete with its boot files?
XOSL can! What about if the WinXP installation resides
on the secondary slave drive?

 

[Jim]

XOSL is a free product and is therefore not supported. However,
it has its own highly responsive newsgroup.

About its updates (or otherwise): XOSL seems to offer all the
facilities you could want for a boot manager, beating many
other products by a long shot, so why update it?

About BootIT: Can it boot into a WinXP installation that
resides in a logical drive, complete with its boot files?
XOSL can!

I don't know in all cases (I did do this w/ Win98 one time, long ago), but I
don't care either, because it's irrelevant. With the use of unlimited
primaries, the issue is, for all intents and purposes, moot.

The reason people use logical partitions for OSs is precisely because they
don't have a feature like unlimited primaries. They exhaust their
primaries, and then have to resort to the extended partition
to "stretch" the multi-boot capabilities of the system. But by using
unlimited primaries, you can now leave your *data* to the extended
partition, as it was intended to be. By using the extended partition for
OSs, you introduce several complexities, the worst being the possibility of
drive letter assignments changing underneath you as you manipulate your
partitions.

What about if the WinXP installation resides
on the secondary slave drive?

Yes. If necessary, it logically switches the HD IDs (which I presume is
what XOSL does).

But here too, BootIt NG makes this feature almost moot (not totally, but
close). I don't really care that XOSL can boot the slave, since I don't
need the slave in most instances for this purpose anyway. As before, the
need for this feature was driven by the limitation of primary partitions.
The only real value of the slave at this point is w/ older OS's with severe
limitations on where they can boot from (e.g., 4GB, 8GB, etc.). This can
still push you into multiple HDs, but XP doesn't seem to suffer from theses
limitation, so the need has lessened considerably as of late. And since you
should be keeping your data on separate partitions anyway (preferably
logical partitions only), the typical OS doesn't really need all that much
space, esp. the older ones. It's the *data* that typically pushes up the
partition size, not the OS. So if you keep the older OSs at the head of the
HD, keep the OS separated from the DATA (thereby minimizing OS primary
size), keep data on logical partitions, and use unlimited primaries, the
slave issue virtually disappears (for OS installation).

BootIt NG (in my opinion) is superior because it works differently than
XOSL, Boot Magic, or most other boot managers. It manages the partition
table, NOT the partition IDs, something first time users doesn't immediately
appreciate. This makes it far more flexible and powerful, and obviates the
need for these other features you described.

But if you or the OP want to use XOSL, fine, I have no quams other than
support. NG support has its place/value, but its not very comforting to
know that if/when a bug is found or enhancement is needed, there's no one to
update and publish changes. You're not claiming XOSL is perfect, are you?!
If all
everyone can do is commiserate over some problem/issue, but no way to
address it in source and published executables, well, as I said initially,
this would concern me. But to each his own.

Jim

 

[Ron Martell]

Alright, I have a simple problem. Well probably not so simple since i
cant seem to figure it out. I have XP Images. I want to put more than
one on a hard drive. I then want to be able to choose which one boots
when i start the computer. I apply the first image. Use Partition
Magic 7 to resize it to about 10 gigs. Then i use PM7 to create
another primary partition. I apply the second image. Goes on great.
But i can only boot to the first image. I have read that you have to
have both your OS's below 8GB to be bootable so i am going to try
this next. If it works then i suppose my problem is solved. So my
question is, is there a way around this? What was the point of saying
you can create 4 primary partitions, yet you cant boot from them past
8GB? Seems like a waste to me, especially with the size of drives now
days. Any help would be appreciated.

Install the BootMagic utility from your Partition Magic CD.

Good luck


Ron Martell Duncan B.C. Canada
--
Microsoft MVP
On-Line Help Computer Service
http://onlinehelp.bc.ca

"The reason computer chips are so small is computers don't eat much."

 

[I'm Dan]

...(snipped)...
The reason people use logical partitions for OSs is precisely
because they don't have a feature like unlimited primaries.
They exhaust their primaries, and then have to resort to the
extended partition to "stretch" the multi-boot capabilities
of the system. But by using unlimited primaries, you can
now leave your *data* to the extended partition, as it was
intended to be.

I'll agree that limited primaries may compel users to put OS's in logical
partitions, but there's really no harm in doing so. You may have a phobia
about putting OS's in logical partitions, but XOSL makes it very easy to
manage them. Linux can run in logical partitions, so why can't Windows?
Well, they can. It's just Microsoft's lame MBR and installer routines that
can't put them there natively, but if you can get them there, they have no
problem running from there and XOSL is one of the few boot managers that can
manage them from there.

And using BING's "unlimited primaries" feature ignores one very glaring
danger -- it's proprietary, meaning only BING knows where those other
primaries are. The dormant partitions (the OS's you're not booted into)
show up to all "normal" utilities, including XP's Disk Management, as
*unallocated* space. It would not be hard to imagine someone trying to use
XP's Disk Management, diskpart, Partition Magic, Partition Commander, fdisk,
or any of a multitude of other utilities and accidentally blowing away your
carefully hidden partitions because the utilities didn't know anything was
there. If you opt to use unlimited primaries, it's crucial that you
restrict yourself to BING and not use other partition management utilities.

BING's "unlimited primaries" is a powerful feature, but the price of
incompatibility with normal disk utilities is high. If BING loses track of
your partitions, you could be in for a heap of grief because no other tools
will work. And don't think that can't happen. As an example, BING uses the
"officially unused" sectors on track 0 (sectors 2-63) for itself. But in a
brazen move a year ago, Intuit TurboTax secretly began using those same
sectors to store their own version of "product activation" data. The effect
was it broke BING, as well as any other boot manager that was designed to
use those sectors. (Admirably, XOSL wasn't designed to use those sectors.)
In a PR fiasco, Intuit had to quickly backpedal and disable their activation
scheme, but it showed that it can happen.

I'm not a BING basher -- I like the program and am a registered user. But
if you're going to champion its "unlimited primaries", it's important to
also be aware of the downside of enabling that feature. And BTW, it should
be pointed out to the OP that BING is not free. It is indeed well-priced,
but the distinction should have been pointed out to the OP earlier.

By using the extended partition for OSs, you introduce
several complexities, the worst being the possibility of
drive letter assignments changing underneath you as you
manipulate your partitions.

That's simply not true. Drive letter assignments are defined by the DiskID
(a 4-byte code in the MBR) and the starting sector location of the partition
in question, irrespective of whether it's a primary partition or logical
partition. Drive letters are no more prone to changing just because it's a
logical partition.

 

[Jim]

I'll agree that limited primaries may compel users to put OS's in logical
partitions, but there's really no harm in doing so. You may have a phobia
about putting OS's in logical partitions, but XOSL makes it very easy to
manage them. Linux can run in logical partitions, so why can't Windows?
Well, they can. It's just Microsoft's lame MBR and installer routines that
can't put them there natively, but if you can get them there, they have no
problem running from there and XOSL is one of the few boot managers that can
manage them from there.

And using BING's "unlimited primaries" feature ignores one very glaring
danger -- it's proprietary, meaning only BING knows where those other
primaries are. The dormant partitions (the OS's you're not booted into)
show up to all "normal" utilities, including XP's Disk Management, as
*unallocated* space. It would not be hard to imagine someone trying to use
XP's Disk Management, diskpart, Partition Magic, Partition Commander, fdisk,
or any of a multitude of other utilities and accidentally blowing away your
carefully hidden partitions because the utilities didn't know anything was
there. If you opt to use unlimited primaries, it's crucial that you
restrict yourself to BING and not use other partition management utilities.

BING's "unlimited primaries" is a powerful feature, but the price of
incompatibility with normal disk utilities is high. If BING loses track of
your partitions, you could be in for a heap of grief because no other tools
will work. And don't think that can't happen. As an example, BING uses the
"officially unused" sectors on track 0 (sectors 2-63) for itself. But in a
brazen move a year ago, Intuit TurboTax secretly began using those same
sectors to store their own version of "product activation" data. The effect
was it broke BING, as well as any other boot manager that was designed to
use those sectors. (Admirably, XOSL wasn't designed to use those sectors.)
In a PR fiasco, Intuit had to quickly backpedal and disable their activation
scheme, but it showed that it can happen.

I'm not a BING basher -- I like the program and am a registered user. But
if you're going to champion its "unlimited primaries", it's important to
also be aware of the downside of enabling that feature. And BTW, it should
be pointed out to the OP that BING is not free. It is indeed well-priced,
but the distinction should have been pointed out to the OP earlier.

Good points.

That's simply not true. Drive letter assignments are defined by the DiskID
(a 4-byte code in the MBR) and the starting sector location of the partition
in question, irrespective of whether it's a primary partition or logical
partition. Drive letters are no more prone to changing just because it's a
logical partition.

http://www.microsoft.com/learning/books/troubleshooting/Solutions/89.asp

Not true, read the above. Logical partitions are always assigned drive
letters AFTER primaries, no matter how many HDs you have, so the
introduction of additional HDs (or removal of existing HDs) always risks the
possibility of drive letter assignments in the extended partition shifting
underneath you. This is why using the extended partition for OS
installation carries its own risks, and one reason MS doesn't officially
support OS installations to the extended partition. Even on a single HD, if
you add a primary partition that you intend to make visible to an OS in the
extended partition, you get a drive letter assignment change to the OS's
logical partition because the new primary will receive its assignment FIRST!

Jim

 

[Less Than 0]

If XOSL is free, where do i download it from? Ill take a free utility
over one i have to pay for any day. Although BootIt NG sounds like a
good program. Ill try installing Boot Magic from the PM7 cd. Hopefully
that works. Thank you for the quick responses and all your advice.

 

[Pegasus \(MVP\)]

If XOSL is free, where do i download it from? Ill take a free utility
over one i have to pay for any day. Although BootIt NG sounds like a
good program. Ill try installing Boot Magic from the PM7 cd. Hopefully
that works. Thank you for the quick responses and all your advice.

I told Google to look for these keywords: xosl download. It found
3630 sites . . .

 

[I'm Dan]

http://www.microsoft.com/learning/books/troubleshooting/Solutions/89.asp

Not true, read the above. Logical partitions are always assigned
drive letters AFTER primaries, no matter how many HDs you
have, so the introduction of additional HDs (or removal of existing
HDs) always risks the possibility of drive letter assignments in
the extended partition shifting underneath you. This is why using
the extended partition for OS installation carries its own risks,
and one reason MS doesn't officially support OS installations
to the extended partition. Even on a single HD, if you add a
primary partition that you intend to make visible to an OS in the
extended partition, you get a drive letter assignment change to
the OS's logical partition because the new primary will receive
its assignment FIRST!

Sorry, but I believe you're taking that reference out of context. That is
describing the way Win9x assigns drive letters and why drive letters move
around when partitions are added/deleted from a Win9x installation. There
is no mention of the fact that NT-family OS's remember drive letters. If
that reference were true for NT-family OS's, you wouldn't have all these
people coming to this ng with complaints like "I reinstalled XP and now it's
drive F:" and other such things.

If you don't believe me, you can prove it to yourself. Start with an
existing XP system with one or more logical volumes in an extended
partition. Note the drive letters, and shut down. Now add a second hard
disk and boot back up. The drive letters previously existing on the main
hard disk will be unchanged. It doesn't matter what manner of partitions,
primary or extended, you have or you create on the second disk, the
previously assigned drive letters will not change.

If you're interested in understanding how NT-family OS's remember drive
letters and when drive letters might or might not change, you'll find more
information on my webpage at www.goodells.net/multiboot.

 

[I'm Dan]

If XOSL is free, where do i download it from? Ill take a free
utility over one i have to pay for any day. Although BootIt NG
sounds like a good program. Ill try installing Boot Magic
from the PM7 cd. Hopefully that works. Thank you for the
quick responses and all your advice.

XOSL can be downloaded from www.ranish.com/part/xosl.htm, or from the
downloads section of the XOSL newsgroup at
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/xosl.

You'll find links to XOSL and several other utilities you might be
interested in on my webpage at www.goodells.net/multiboot.

 

[Jim]

Sorry, but I believe you're taking that reference out of context. That is
describing the way Win9x assigns drive letters and why drive letters move
around when partitions are added/deleted from a Win9x installation. There
is no mention of the fact that NT-family OS's remember drive letters. If
that reference were true for NT-family OS's, you wouldn't have all these
people coming to this ng with complaints like "I reinstalled XP and now it's
drive F:" and other such things.

If you don't believe me, you can prove it to yourself. Start with an
existing XP system with one or more logical volumes in an extended
partition. Note the drive letters, and shut down. Now add a second hard
disk and boot back up. The drive letters previously existing on the main
hard disk will be unchanged. It doesn't matter what manner of partitions,
primary or extended, you have or you create on the second disk, the
previously assigned drive letters will not change.

If you're interested in understanding how NT-family OS's remember drive
letters and when drive letters might or might not change, you'll find more
information on my webpage at www.goodells.net/multiboot.

I realize this affects Win9x OS's more since there does seem to be a level
of persistence in the "NT family". But I wasn't limiting my comments to
only the NT family (never made that claim), if people are dual booting,
there's no reason to not consider the possibility of Win9x installations as
well. You can be sure that had I *assumed* only the NT family and drew your
conclusions, somebody else would have come along and called me on the other
side complaining I had not considered it.

In this light, I stand by my original statement, "By using the extended
partition for OSs, you introduce several complexities, the worst being the
possibility of drive letter assignments changing underneath you as you
manipulate your partitions." It only becomes a debateable issue when
considered in a specific context, something I never attempted to do, I
generalized precisely to avoid "getting into it", knowing where this would
lead.

Jim

 

[I'm Dan]

I realize this affects Win9x OS's more since there does seem to
be a level of persistence in the "NT family". But I wasn't limiting
my comments to only the NT family (never made that claim),
if people are dual booting, there's no reason to not consider the
possibility of Win9x installations as well.

Well, we *are* in an XP newsgroup, after all. I stated, "Drive letter
assignments are defined by the DiskID (a 4-byte code in the MBR) and the
starting sector location of the partition in question, irrespective of
whether it's a primary partition or logical partition. Drive letters are no
more prone to changing just because it's a logical partition." We are in an
XP newsgroup, and my statement is true for XP. You refuted my statement by
offering as proof, in this XP newsgroup, without qualification, a reference
that does not apply to XP.

At least now we've clarified for others listening in that your concerns are
about Win9x, not XP.