Stupid Question

But for me it's not lol ...Ok here goes ..I have two seperate harddrives ..BOTH have windows XP on them and I have NO idea what drive is being booted at startup ..I want to clean off all the files from windows on the one that isnt being used ...but obviously dont want to start deleting windows files on the assumption i have the correct drive!!

They both have identical folders to a degree ..its very hard to tell

thx :confused

 

How about unplugging one drive then reboot. take the second drive and change the jumper settings to slave.

 

I sorta did that in the begining ..they both boot

 

If you unplug one and it doesn't boot properly then you know that this is the one you are working off of. After it's up and running rename it. that way you will know which is which.
there is probably an easier way but if don't want to wait for that answer try this

 

if both are mirrored then once you unplug one boot without hooking the second inline. Once that one is running go to device manager and rename it.

 

K thx i will try these suggestions

 

Or get into your boot file and rename the top one, which should be your latest install, Yuo'll then have a different line on your boot screen. I've had as many as five OS's on and the best thing to do is to name the partition first and then install there and changing the boot file. You'll never be confused again. Oh, boot.ini file can be accessed through 'msconfig' in the run command. Be very careful and just change the name as things can go south very quickly in there and make a doorstop out of your rig until you do a fixboot.

 

Try right-clicking My Computer select Manage. In the left pane Disk Management.
In the graph the one marked System tells you which one you are currently booting.

Another quick thing to do is look at Program files on each HD. Does one have a lot more current programs than the other? That should tell you which copy of XP you use the most.

 

Unplug the power to the drive..this is the easiest way imho

Blades :major