2 or more OS's

I was wondering if it's posible to have 2 operating systems or more
I use WIN ME now but i want to install XP
BUT:
there are some hardware/software components that don't work under XP

So i can't give up ME evan if i want
So i think of installing XP but last time i tryed that if i remember right .. i couldn't boot under ME

Can someone please give me a step-by-step on how to do that ?
meaning having ME and XP and the posibility to load up witch one i want

 

That's actually pretty easy. You need a free partition to install XP onto. A diffrent one from ME. Then just run the XP installer like normal. When asked, sleect make a new install, and then when it asks where to install pick a partition that ME isn't on.

The windows XP installer will automaticly setup a boot menu for you to pick which OS you want to run.

 

LOL .. is that all ???

I actualy have 2 hard discs drives :
1 old drive of 10 gb
and 1 dirve of 80 gb witch is split into 2 hdd's :
1 of 60 gb on witch the win ME is
and 1 20 gb on witch i keep all my archives

the separate hdd of 10gb is empty at the moment .. i just formated it .. scan disc and defrag .. ( the first time i do it in 5-6 years of usage ) .. the pour thing deserved that

So if i install win XP on drive D: (the one i just formated) is it ok ?
And how can i choose witch Win to load up ?
Is there a option when the PC boots ?

and BTW .. do i have to intall the programs again ? coz i think that the programs i have ware installed under ME so they won't work under XP

 

Yes, you can install to drive D:. When running the install just make sure to select new install and then pick drive D:.

Since it is going to be a new install it won't have anything to do with ME. Everything done in ME won't effect XP, and everything done in XP won't effect ME. That means apps from ME won't show up in XP either.

As for booting, XP will create a boot menu by default. This menu will show up while booting the computer.

 

Just to add a little more detail to the advice already given, you might want to read through this:

http://www.vlaurie.com/computers2/Articles/dualboot.htm

If you're a glutton for knowledge, you can read the 'official' Microsoft notes on dual booting:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;306559&sd=tech

It's really no big deal to do. I have Win98SE & XP in a dual boot config & love it.

 

I run two duel boot pc's, yep is simple!
Always load the oldest OS first, the last OS installed will become default too boot, but you can select which too boot manualy, I believe by default you have 30 seconds too choose, or change the default in system properties.

Go for it, if ya have problems, will try to assist.

 

Thanks Coco , Wavetar and ASUS for the advice

Yes i did manage to install win XP -Profesional edition
Although i did choose new instalation .. and i waited .. i waited for the text where it would say : coose your location .. and change to D:/blah/blah ..but it never came
The surprising thing is that evan if it never asked me it installed itself right on drive D .. smart pice of software

And yes i can Run bouth ME and XP in paralel .. witch is great

But i got my first problem ..
I am not a PC noob .. although i don't do any programing or twickle any advanced settings .. but i AM an XP noob .. but it's similar with ME

The prob i got is that the desktop icons are auto-aranged by name .. or by type , size etc ..
The thing is that i can't Uncheck that option or i don't how how .. and the recycle bin in on the top of my computer and i'm not used to that ...

Right now i am installing some Drivers , and Downloading some of them from the net for XP this time ..and installing some software components .. i hope they'll all work ..
If not i know where i can ask for advice

 

I don't get what you mean, by the recycle bin is onto of your computer. It's on the desktop, which is where it's always been in windows95 and up.

As for the arraged icons on the desktop, you can control all those options by right clicking the desktop and goign the to arrage icon menu, then uncheck auto arrange.

 

Also, i'd be surprised if you actually have some hardware/software that is incompatible with XP but works on ME.

let us know what they are and we can try to help or find a workaround... anything to migrate you away from the perils of ME

 

Right ..
I got the icon thing

The recycle been was ABOVE my com

And yes .. i did found a hardware/software witch is incompatible with XP
It's my old CD-RW burning software .. and it did state that it's NOT gonna work under XP

I'm downloading Nero ... see if that works out

BTW :
the moddel is LG CD-RW CED-8080B
And the software is Easey Cd creator or someting ...

 

Try TweakUI. You can fiddle with lots of desktop settings through there, including making My Computer the first icon instead of my documents or whatever.

Easy CD Creator.. you don't wanna use. Bad stuff. Get Nero or WinOnCd or Alcohol 120% or somthing like that.

 

Ok guys i stood in front of the PC all day now .. and tryed to install this and that .. etc .

And the REALY surprising thing is that ALL the games i had (installed under ME) they worked .. i just had to do a couple of shortcuts on the desktop and that was it

But it was imposible NOT to face some problems .. but some of them i figured how to fix them

But some of them no matter what i tryed didn't work :

1. Scanner driver :
The scanner driver .. i have an Genius ColorPage View Pro .. and i did search for an XP driver but noting

2. Fast CD 1.0 - cd image program
It's simple .. i can't install it .. lol
And all the original CD's are gone .. you know .. give one to a friend , loan it etc. and i lost track of them ...
All i'm left with is the images on the HDD
So i can't load them up

3. I did install XP on drive D as i told you but i forgot to mention or i completly forgot that that HDD is over 5 years old and corse it has low RPM's
So i did it all over again .. and installed it on E partition
And i'll use D drive for keeping archives music (dosen't requre top-edge Hdd's ) etc.
He's what i did :
Loaded up ME .. and did a right click on drive D and selected format .. (so i can get rid of the XP)
All ok until now .. Moved the archive from E to D and formated E so it would be sqeaky-clean
And porceded with the XP install (again)
BUT when it was finished in the bood section .. where i got that screen where i can choose the Operating systems .. i had 2 XP's and 1 ME
1 XP sayes someting like " oops roong one dummy " .. lol kidding .. someting like missing dll and file path
1 XP is good
also ME works as well

Is there some way to get rid of the phantom XP from the boot section ?


Well that's all my major concerns

So far i did try out Nero Burning ROM 6.6.0.6 .. and it works GREAT .. phht .. forget Easey CD Creator

Also i got a forum question :
Is it ok to post my problems in this thread ? or do i have to open a new one for each problem ?

Anyway I am NOT gonna go back to ME ever .. XP is running 1000X faster and way more stabile
But I'm not gonna Uninstall ME .. for 1 thing evan if in ME everything works slower atleast i don't have the scanner and Fast CD prob. .. also it's good to keep it as a Back-up OS

 

1. If the scanner is old you might be out of luck for finding a driver. It can be tricky to find them, but you could get lucky, also remember a driver meant for 2000 could work as well.

2. I don't know what you're using that program for, but if you just want to be able to use some iso files then use daemon tools, it's a free app and it can mount basicly any ISO format.

3. When in XP press "windows+pause" go to the advanced tab, under startup and recovery press settings. From here you can use the gui to edit stuff or press the edit button itself to see a tex file with all the configurations. Simply delete the line under [operating systems] for the non working XP install. You can also change the names it displays from here if you like.

eg. The line "multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect /NoExecute=OptIn" could be cahnged to something like "multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Working Windows" /fastdetect /NoExecute=OptIn" if you liked.

As for the making of a new thread, this is fine. If you really wanted to you could have posted the questions in a new thread though, just don't do both.

 

right i did download a win 2000 driver but when i double clicked on it to install i got someting like this : 16bit ms-dos subsystem
E:\windows\blah\blah . The system file is not suitable for running ms-dos and microsoft windows applications . Choose "close" to terminate the application

and i got 2 options :
Close and Ignore .. and they bouth did the same thing .. i mean closing the dialog box .. and then silence

Yeah i did Download that one but it dosen't reconise any of the ISO file i already have

I don't get it .. how do i press ''windows+pause"?
Is it the windows button and pause button on my keybord at the same time ?
I tryed that and noting

 

1. Not much more I can say about this one. Sorry.

2. What sort of ISO files do you have then? Tell us the extensions.

3. By windows+pause I mean the windows key and the pause key in the uper right hand corner. It will work, maybe you have a fancy keyboard with an flock key or something.

At any rate win+pause just brings up the system properties windows (right click my computer and select properties). I was just writing the shortest way to get there, but you can open it however you like.

 

Right , no problem
I still have ME if i want to use the scanner

Some of them are .FCD and some .vcd
the .FCD DON'T work at all
2 of the .vcd's actualy work .. but the rest don't

Right i have done it
But i have no ideea witch one do delete or evan how to do it

Anyway i'll copy past what it sayed in the boot record :

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect
C:\="Microsoft Windows Millennium Edition"

in the ms-dos windows the First XP option is the good one .. and the ME option is the last witch it works

So i guess that the 2-nd and 3-rd XP are fake

 

Hm..... if the first option definatley works, just delete the other two. the partition(2) one definatley sounds wrong, to be honest I see the bottom most XP option more often....

 

Ok first of all i don't know HOW to delete them
I did try it to do it in the boot log .text file but after saving i got the same thing again

I want to get rid of the 2 fake XP's on the startup .. coz i have 3 of them ..

So i'll post the boot again :

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect
C:\="Microsoft Windows Millennium Edition"



To make it easeyer for you guys to figure out the 2 fake XP's i'll tell you the history of the XP instalation and my HDD config.

2 HDD's : 1 of them has 80gb and one hard 10 gb
3 Hdd's in My computer .. the 80gb one is partitioned into 2 Hdd's ( C: = 60 GB ; E: = 20 gb aprox. )
And the D: hard-drive is the old 10gb one

So
ME is intalled on drive C:

Ok now the XP installation history :
Long time ago i did install XP on drive C: but i deleted that after a short while using norton commander

recently :
I installed XP on drive D:
I formated drive D: coz it was a old/slow hdd and ofcoure the XP was gone

Finally i installed XP on drive E: (witch is the same hdd with C: but a diferent partition)
And i runn it on drive E: now ...
And it work great .. except the few remaining problems i posted before

So i though that would help you figure out witch XP is the good one .. and HOW to delete the fake 2

oh and PS. :
If i screw someting up and i delete the rong boot record (if i ever find out how ..lol) is there some way to get back (in ME ?)

Thanks

 

Before you do anything, make a copy of your "boot.ini" file. This is the file that contains the boot loader information you've posted. Just copy & paste it into it's own folder or something to keep it safe.

Now, the 'real' XP should be this one:

multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect

Because it's telling us it's loading on the second partition of physical disk zero, which should be your 20GB "E" partitioned drive.

Now, go into system->advanced->startup & recovery->edit. Notice all this really does is bring up the "boot.ini" file in Notepad. Erase the two lines you don't want and click on 'file' and then 'save'.

Reboot your machine and you should now only see a single XP line and a single ME line. The XP should work. If it doesn't, don't panic. Just boot into ME and replace the modified "boot.ini" file with the one you saved. Be sure to keep a copy of the file in it's 'safe' place.

Repeat until you find the correct line that works, although it should be the one I pointed out above.

 

Just to add, make sure when you backup the boot.ini file that you back it up to an HD that you can see from ME. Because ME cannot read ntfs drives.

 

Yes, absolutely...I always forget the NTFS thing because I tend to use FAT32 in my dual boot set-ups to allow easy troubleshooting/deleting/repairing from either OS.

 

I am preaty soure all the hard drives can be seen or read in ME .. LOL
i have 2 qestion before i do this :
Is it ok just to copy/paste the code in the boot text and sacve it as a text doc in a safe place ? is it enouth ?

The other thing is that in case i have to restore the prev. settings .. where can i find this boot.ini ?
I did a search of the windows folder and noting ..

 

It's on the root C:\ drive. You'll have to go into Windows Explorer->Tools->Folder Options->View and check off "show hidden files and folders", and uncheck "hide protected operating system files".

As far as saving a copy of the file for safekeeping, just right-click & copy the boot.ini file (once you've found it) and paste it somewhere besides the root of the C drive. In fact, paste it in a couple of different places, it won't hurt anything.

 

Right .. i found the boot.ini file , i copyed it in several locations .. and i did delete the other 2 enterys in the boot file

And it works great
only 2 options and they bouth work

Thanks alot guys