Windows Dual Boot HDD mapping

[diegoarbe]

Hello,

I have a computer with two hard drives each with windows xp
installation aimed at something different.
I have it currently set up to dual boot at startup using windows
standard bootloader.

At present, when I load any of the two installations I can see both
hard drives, one as C: and the other one as D:. I want each windows to
be only to see their own hard drive and thats it. When I load the OS
in HDD1, only to be able to see itself and the same for the other hard
drive.

How can I make this happen?

Thank you!

Diego

 

[John John]

You will have to use a third party boot manager to do it, BootItNG or
XOSL can do this. The only other way would be to do it by messy, manual
editing of the partition table everytime you wanted to boot to the other
operating system.

John

 

[philo]

Hello,

I have a computer with two hard drives each with windows xp
installation aimed at something different.
I have it currently set up to dual boot at startup using windows
standard bootloader.

At present, when I load any of the two installations I can see both
hard drives, one as C: and the other one as D:. I want each windows to
be only to see their own hard drive and thats it. When I load the OS
in HDD1, only to be able to see itself and the same for the other hard
drive.

How can I make this happen?

Thank you!

Diego

Although you can unassign drive letters in disk management...you cannot
unassign the drive containing your "boot files"...
so with your present setup you'd only be able to unassign one OS.


If you want to re-setup your machine with a small primary partition
and two logical drives...
you could install your two OS's on the two logical drives...
your boot files would have to remain on the small primary partition...
but you could unassign the other drive letters from each OS by using disk
management

 

[Gilgamesh]

You will have to use a third party boot manager to do it, BootItNG or XOSL
can do this. The only other way would be to do it by messy, manual
editing of the partition table everytime you wanted to boot to the other
operating system.

I use the BootMagic tool that comes with PartitionMagic

 

[Timothy Daniels]

I make it happen with 2 miniature DPST toggle switches. They have
1/4" threaded barrels which fit conveniently through the ventilation holes
in the front of the PC's chassis under the plastic air intake facia, and I
toggle them with a paperclip that I've unbent and re-bent to act as a
switch control tool. Each switch controls the power going to a HD,
and that controls the HD's visibility. (The power must be switched
when the system is OFF!) Since the IDE controllers don't like lone
devices at the mid-point of IDE cables, the HDs are put at the mid-point
if there can be another powered IDE device (e.g. optical drive) at the
end-point. Otherwise, they are put at the end-point with no other
device on the cable. (Read that carefully.) The BIOS's Hard Drive
Boot Order automatically puts a single hard drive at the head of the
boot order, so the single HD that is powered will always the booting
HD. If you don't know what "DPST" means, don't try it. I blew out
a HD p.c. board by mis-wiring one of the switches.

*TimDaniels*