Where does it say that it is impossible to boot W xp when it's on

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Where does it say that it is impossible to boot W xp when it's on an external
hard drive?
 
If you can do it and if you can supply full details then you
will have a captive audience in this forum!
 
But where does it say that it can not be done?
________________________________________________________
 
It's the current understanding. AFAIK, until now nobody
has found a way to do it. On the other hand, everybody
thought that you could not boot from a logical drive, until
XOSL came along and did it.
 
Pegasus said:
It's the current understanding. AFAIK, until now nobody
has found a way to do it. On the other hand, everybody
thought that you could not boot from a logical drive, until
XOSL came along and did it.
Click to expand...

It is theoretically possible to boot from an external HD
drive enclosure but it could still be equivocal. There are
instances when My Computer shows the external USB HD as a
"local disk" versus Removable Disk and Drive Management can
configure it just like an ordinary hard drive partition in
the computer. Moreover, deleting files puts them into the
recycle bin. And these drives also have the System Volume
Information folder, which are uncharacteristic of removable
disks. If an external USB hard drive is going to behave just
like a local disk, then it should have the same potential to
be a system partition just like any other ordinary local disk
on the HD.
 
But is there anything in print?
________________________________________________________
 
can you read?

do your own research!!!

search the newsgroups for previous post!!

Google search!!!
 
No matter where you go on Google Groups, there's always someone who is
unkind in his/her responses. They go through life that way, maybe their
wives, beat them, whatever. But in the safety and anonimity of their
little computer room, they all of a sudden become wild terrors!

The remark, "can you read" should be taken with a grain of salt by
considering the source.
 
b11_ said:
Where does it say that it is impossible to boot W xp when it's on an external
hard drive?
Click to expand...


No where. Just because no one's ever found a way to do so yet, doesn't
necessarily means that it's "impossible."


--

Bruce Chambers

Help us help you:



You can have peace. Or you can have freedom. Don't ever count on having
both at once. - RAH
 
from Help Menu.
Tips for posting
Before posting a question to a discussion group, read and use the following
tips:

Before you post a question, try to find an answer by first searching the
Web, and searching the appropriate discussion groups.

some people don't make any effort on their own. in other words don't even
try to help themselves or try to figure out on their own. need to be spoon
fed. no sympathy here. not sure they will even understand response. even if
in plain English. don't use resources they have available. Search MS KB or
windows Help and support program. too many to mention.

i take pride in figuring it out on my own. most of my post are to help
others. not begging for others to help me.
 
b11_ said:
But is there anything in print?
________________________________________________________
Click to expand...


b11:
Hardly a week goes by when you don't come across one or more postings in
this newsgroup and similar newsgroups by some contributor who will state,
"Yes, a USB external hard drive (containing the XP OS) is bootable as long
as your motherboard's BIOS supports that capability", or words to that
effect. To the best of my knowledge, echoing what you've already heard from
the responses you've so far received, a USB EHD is *not* bootable with the
XP OS. I, and my colleagues, have worked with a wide variety of USB EHDs
with motherboards whose BIOS presumably supports USB booting capability, but
we've yet to get a USB EHD to boot.

In response to my query on this issue about a year or so ago, here's the
response I received from Symantec...
"Thank you for contacting Symantec Online Technical Support.
You wanted to know if you could boot from a external USB drive that you have
cloned to using Norton Ghost.
The issue at hand would be whether the drive would be recognized in the boot
sequence of your system. To the best of my knowledge, there is no
motherboard that supports booting from external devices currently. This
really has nothing to do with Norton Ghost.
Best regards,
Symantec Authorized Technical Support"

And from Western Digital's FAQ...
"Question: Can I boot my computer using an external (FireWire, USB, Combo
hard drive?
Answer: Western Digital does not provide technical support for booting your
computer using an external hard drive. BIOS manufacturers who design PC
system BIOS chips have informed Western Digital that it is not currently
possible to boot your computer with an external hard drive."

I've also communicated with a number of manufacturers of hard drives and USB
enclosures re this issue, and all of them, without exception, have stated
that a USB EHD is not bootable in a Windows XP environment. I'm aware of
reports from a number of users who have stated they have done so but I've
yet to come across a reliable, documented source confirming this capability.
Indeed, one of the contributors to this newsgroup, Edward Thompson, has
emphatically stated that he is able to do so through the use of a bootable
floppy disk containing a number of DOS commands centered around a program
called DUSE. (You can do a Google search re the DUSE program). But I've been
unable to duplicate Edward's success. (Perhaps he will see this thread and
comment further on his method).

There is nothing written in the stars that says "You cannot boot from a USB
external hard drive containing the XP operating system". Indeed, Microsoft
itself published a "white paper" (see
http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/device/storage/usb-boot.mspx#EGAA) a few years
ago presumably encouraging motherboard manufacturers to provide USB booting
capability for their products. MS pointed out that there was nothing
intrinsically incorporated in the XP OS that would prevent this capability.
Yet the paper also states that "Windows as it exists today is currently not
optimized to run as an installed operating system from USB attached
mass-storage or CD." But on the other hand, "The best thing about adding
another bootable bus to Windows is that manufacturers can take advantage of
much of the existing Windows boot process. As long as a new device looks and
behaves like existing devices while NT Loader loads the system, new devices
can be made to work like old devices. The goal for booting Windows from a
USB device is to use as much of the existing Windows boot process with as
little change as possible."

So, go figure. Perhaps, within the next couple of years, all this will
become moot, or at least a lot less significant than it seems today as we
gravitate more & more to SATA external hard drives with their considerable
dual advantages of being bootable and yielding far better performance than
the USB devices with us today.
Anna
 
Nothing is IMPOSSIBLE. Impracticable? Yes. Currently not possible?
Maybe. MS states that it's not supported. With enough time and effort
and knowledge about the requirements, I've seen claims of being able get
a copy of XP that is on a removable to boot and run. But it ISN'T
happening using ANY normal methods of operating system installation.
Happy?
 
Where does it say that it is impossible to boot W xp when it's on an external
hard drive?
Click to expand...

As far as I know, there are really only two hard drive interfaces that you can
successfully use to install XP onto an external hard drive.

SCSI

External SATA (aka eSATA)


The real reason is that there has not been any successful installs on
USB/Firewire drive mainly because the USB/Firewire drivers usually require a
full working XP to install.load.


As previously stated, if/when you are successful in setting up a USB XP boot,
please post your solutions. Millions of XP users are "waiting" for this style
of install.
 
b11_ said:
Where does it say that it is impossible to boot W xp when it's on an external
hard drive?
Click to expand...

Here, right in this newsgroup, over and over and over....... <yawn>

zzzzzzzzzzzzzz.....

Steve N.
 
Only know what I've read, and you can read too, of course, but if you have
the time and energy to pursue it (I haven't), have a look at this thread.
There are some other posters (not to the MS groups) that were trying it,
can't say what they found.
 
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