Dual Boot Windows 7 with XP/Vista in three easy steps

[Guest]

I have three Xps, one Vista Home Premium. All were working fine when I installed Windows 7. Now Win7 works fine, whereas Vista, takes ages to open, denies access to non-admin accounts, and for admin it accepts password but still no desktop. Ctrl+Alt+Del brings the task manager though but nothing else and I have to shut it down. Any ideas? I use Acronis Disk Director to carve out 2 partitions of 20 Mb each (though I put win7 on a different Primary partition whereas Xp, Vista are all on logical drives)
Guest

 

[bigclick]

Good to see this article revived. Dual booting is not for the everyday user though. I've come to the conclusion that's it's easier to buy a laptop with a bad display and network several computers. Actually, if a computer maker would produce a laptop sized form factor or laptop minus the display...I'd be interested. I don't care for the problems of dual booting but like saving desk space.

 

[Guest]

when i installed windows seven, my windows vista was "de-activated"...when i activated vista, windows seven "de-activated"...and it repeats...what can i do?

 

[Guest]

I regularly used and liked Acronis on my Vista 64 Ultimate. But after I installed a Win 7 amd 64 Ultimate, Acronis destroyed the boot sectors. There may be an update for Acronis; I haven't looked and won't try it. The WIN 7 INSTALL DISK WAS ABLE TO REPAIR THE BOOT SECTORS. gOOD LUCK!

 

[maestromasada]

Why dual-boot any more when you can use XP Mode or even better WMWare????

 

[Guest]

I've installed tri boot, xp, vista and win7. Now I want to remove vista. How do I remove vista leaving me dual boot xp and Win7?

 

[Matthew DeCarlo]

Should basically work the same as in the guide. Delete the Vista partition, reallocate the open space to another partition (or partitions) and if you have any troubles booting, run Windows 7's Startup Repair.

 

[Guest]

'You' still want to dual boot with XP because there are MANY games that run on XP but will not run on 7, even in an "XP compatibility mode". And there are some programs that people like myself use that will not work on 7.

 

[DixHistory]

Have retail Win7 installed can I also install retail win xp?

I just bought Windows 7 64 bit and did a clean install. I love it and the ease it installed. Most things work great but I have hardware that date to windows 95 that I managed to keep working up to and through XP service pack3. That includes my Epsen 740 printer and cheap ink as well as my USB scanner that has no Vista driver much less a Win7.

Since I have also have a retail XP version of windows, can I do right the oppsite and create a partion for XP with out messing up the Win7 that is installed on my computer now?

Then boot to win xp to do email using IE6 and outlook express. Pretty sure the scanner and printer should work if IE6 does.

Thanks in advance for your comments and thoughts.

 

[Matthew DeCarlo]

You could do the reverse (you'll probably have to repair your boot loader with the Windows 7 disc after installing XP). That said, you might be able to set things up in a virtual machine -- either with your license and VirtualBox or with Windows XP Mode (requires Windows 7 Professional or higher). Worth a shot, this way you don't have to reboot every time you want to use XP.

 

[Guest]

Thanks Matthew...I have the 64 bit home premium. I do have an Esata dock drive with a couple of hard drives all sata sitting around.

Would it be better to put win xp home on the notebook and then install Win 7 on the Esata or can that even be done?

 

[Sevilho]

Suppose I have dual boot XP and Win 7 configuration.

1. Will I see system XP partition as C: (as usial) in XP environment and system Win 7 partition as C: (as usial) in Win 7 environment ?

2. What letter wil have the adjacent system partition ? D:, E: ? May I change this letter to U: (for example).

 

[Guest]

Hi, I have a new laptop with Windows 7 Home Premium installed and wish to Run Windows XP as well to run a couple of programs that cannot run in Windows 7. I used this article "Dual Boot Windows 7 with XP/Vista in three easy steps" and Shrank my C: drive by 50 GB which gave me 48.83 GB of Unallocated space. All this went fine.

However, after the final stages of creating a "New Simple Volume" following the directions and leaving the maximum space defaulting in the "Simple volume size in MB:" box, assigning the Drive letter "E" (I renamed the DVD drive to "F", New Volume name (Windows XP), when I click "Finish" I get the following message:

"The operation you selected will convert the selected basic disk(s) to dynamic disk(s). If you convert the disk(s) to dynamic, you will not be able to start installed operating systems from any volume on the disk(s) (except the current boot volume). Are you sure you want to continue?" There is only a "Yes" & "No" button, no "Back" one.

The first time, I clicked "No" as I was not sure & went to do some more research. This left the 48.83 GB showing as Unallocated, so I went back and did it all again selecting "Yes" at the end. I then get the following message:

"There is not enough space available on the disk(s) to complete this operation."

So I have now tried several more times, each time selecting a smaller & smaller number of GB, right down to 30.00, (It actually shows in MB, so I put 30000), but still get the not enough space message. I have rebooted the computer to see if something changes, but cannot get it to give me the "Healthy Primary Partition" that it is supposed to.

Is there something I am missing, like maybe the Home Premium version doesn't do this or something. I might add, that the disk already has a partition as D: drive, it is the "Recover" drive & came like that, so looks to me like it should work. Thanks in anticipation of some help.

Katnko.

 

[Guest]

what is WMware please explain looks intersting!!

 

[Guest]

you cant run windows xp or any other OS in dynamic disk.
just press right click on unallocated space change the disc to "basic" instead of "dynamic".
and make sure it is primary partition.
and hopefully it will solve your problem.

 

[Guest]

can you please guide me through that commands??
i have xp installed in drive c(74.52 G) and i dont have any other partitions.
i want the commands for resizing the c.
and i m supposed to fromat the unallocated space through disk management
and then install win 7??rite?

 

[Guest]

Any thoughts as to any issues that may arise if running XP on raid10, and then installing dual boot to W7?


Ta.

 

[Guest]

pls i have win7 installed but i need window xp on another partition which i installed and disable window7 to boot how do i go about it

 

[Guest]

I have XP 64 in my computer, and when I installed w7 ultimate, I never had the chance to choose the SO to be launched at the boot.
I've installed 7 on a different HDD. When I boot my PC, XP launches automatically. When I choose manually to boot from the disk where W7 is installed, I receive a "disk error" and nothing happens so I need to reset.
But when I boot my PC with my W7 dvd into the drive, I get the chance to choose between W7 or the "previous version" launch (the Windows 7 boot choice window).
Any idea on why does this happen? W7 seems to have been correctly installed and it works fine when I boot with the DVD into the drive.

Thanks!
Please send any info regarding this to this direction: [email address removed]

 

[Guest]

I tried t do it and this is the 12th place I have looked for answers.I sttill cannot put my win 7 ultimate alongside win 7 home premium. Everytime I get to the custom part I try to put onto the disk H which is my new partition and it comes up with disk cannot be used error code 4. Any help I am wanting to use ultimate for the xp mode for games