Can Boot Switcher do this?

Ok, so I want to run two operating systems, XP and VistaRC2. I had Vista running on my little Compaq Laptop this weekend, but it wasn't solid enough to use while I'm at school (I rely too much on my computer). So I was looking for a dual-boot solution. Because windows has installed itself and taken my entire harddrive as the "System partition" I can't create a new partition for Vista, except on an external hard drive... So the questions:

I have been told that I will not be able to boot an OS from an external hard drive, is this true?

also, if I download Boot Switcher or a comparable program will I be able to tell my computer to boot from drive F (the location of Vista)?

Finally is there any way to create a boot cd where I could point my computer toward the location of Vista simply by "pressing any button to boot from cd"?

My computer's info: Compaq R3000 Laptop, Pentium 4, the external is a usb 2.0 drive, 20gig partition space just for Vista and related files.

Thanks - Steve.

 

See below

 

I am not sure I understand,What size is the drive of the computer running XP right now?

You can install both XP and Vista on that comp if the drive is big enough.

Because windows has installed itself and taken my entire harddrive as the "System partition" I can't create a new partition for Vista

Yes you can with a partiton manager or you can format the drive with a new install of XP as long as you have enough space. I would say at least 60GB but it doesn't have to be that big.

My computer's info: Compaq R3000 Laptop, Pentium 4, the external is a usb 2.0 drive, 20gig partition space just for Vista and related files.

Are you running XP on the Compaq and the drive is too small?

 

Ah, ok. So the info was a little unclear. The drive is 60GB on my laptop. I just reinstalled XP, only to find out that the partition manager can't make a new partition for Vista, because when XP installed it made the whole drive a partition for the boot files (the system partition). So I can't delete this partition unless i reformat, which i really can't do because i'm at school, so i have work i need to do everyday. Instead of using the laptop's hard drive, i was thinking maybe it would be possible to boot from an external hard drive, one that I can partition and reformat all I want without messing up my day to day work.
The 20GB partition is on the external, all it has right now is the ISO file for RC2, which I'll burn to DVD and install to that drive, if I can boot from it.

 

O.K.

If you use Partiton Magic which is a seperate software than Windows computer management you can divide the "System partition" without losing any Data. But it's not free.

I don't know of a free one that will but you could look around if you like.

To boot from the external It would probably depend on how your drive is connected. You might try changing the boot order in the BIOS but I cant remember if there is an option for external drives. You might try and make the external the slave drive and boot from it.

 

I think it may depend on what kind of external hard drive you have. If by chance it's an external SATA HD you probably will be able to boot from it as external SATA drives generally appear to be internal drives to a WinXP OS (and, I assume the same is true for Vista but don't know). On the other hand, external USB drives are not bootable from a "stock" WinXP installation unless you're willing to make some rather hairy modifications to your system (including some registry editing).

I've seen an article on the web somewhere about how to modify an XP installation to make it possible to boot from an external hard drive and it looked like more trouble than it was worth. Thought I'd bookmarked it anyway though, but can't find it right now. Seems like I found a link to it originally here on MG so you might try searching the forums for it -- search for "booting external USB drive" or something similar maybe?

Of course, it may be that Vista allows booting from an external USB drive as well as a SATA drive. Not sure about firewire drives and XP but I think XP won't boot from those either. Last I heard the only type of external drive that a standard install of XP can boot from is a SATA drive. But even if you can, in theory, boot to an external drive in Windows Vista, if your onboard internal drive is XP that may be the limiting factor preventing you from booting to the external Vista drive.

Good luck and let us know if you're able to get it working.

 

I found an article on booting from an external USB drive here:

http://www.informationweek.com/hardware/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=28700158

According to this many newer computers can boot from USB drives, while older one's can't (or can't unless your OS is modified to work around the BIOS's limitations I guess). I'd guess the difference is in the BIOS, but don't know what it is exactly.

I've heard that Vista will make it possible to boot up in a few seconds by using flash memory (perhaps a flash drive inserted into a USB port) to store most of the files needed to boot. Anyway, hope the link above may be of some help if your external drive is USB.