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making a hard disk dual bootable

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7 replies

by singh_surjit

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I HAD 17.2 GB HARD DISK WITH SEVEN PARTITIONS
OF 2.1 GB. I HAD ALREADY LOADED WIN-98 AND WANT TO INSTALL WIN-NT SERVER AND MAKE IT DUAL-BOOTABLE . BEFORE GIVING
A REPLY TAKE FOLLWING ASSUMPTIONS .

1. DISK HAS A IMPORTANT DATA SO IT CANNOT BE
FORMATTED.
2. AND ALL THE PROGRAMS IN WIN-98 SHOULD WORK PROPERLY.
3. NO NTFS PARTITIONS.

4. PARTITIONS SHOULD NOT EXCEED 2.1 GB

7 replies

by avachon

Hi, okay, I'm going to add another assumption - the partition on which you load nt server should be fat16. Remember, 98 can read/write fat32 but nt cannot. If that requirement is fulfilled, you can use nt's 3 disks and CD to load it in a partition separate from 98. NT will "pick up" the boot information from 98 and add it to ntldr. You will be able to select between 98 and server. You will need to reload the applications you want to use with NT. Loading nt should not affect 98 or its application associations. But, anybody will tell you that a full backup of your data should be done. Just a word to the wise. So you might have a final scenario such as: drive C: (boot files for 98 and nt, partition must be fat16); drive D: win98; drive E: apps98; drive F: data98; drive G: winnt; drive H: winntapps; driveI: winntdata. This scenario splits assigns something to every drive and keeps things clear. You, of course, may have a different scenario in mind. Good luck.

by rosewood

Use Powerquest partition magic and boot magic to split, delete and resize all partitions any way you like. I haven't tried this with NT yet but it works with Linux and Windows 98. A free trial download is available on the Internet. It has a neat utility that searches your hard drive/s for all OSs and if you add new partitions you can say which type of operating system its going to use (linux, FAT32, Dos etc) It is a very simple to use program and has good help files.

by ronnonf

The way it works is as follows you install the lower grade OSs first then work your way up. It should go as follows win3x, win9x, winnt wrk 3.51, winnt wrk 4.0, winnt Server, Win2k Pro, Server...

What happens is Win9x modifies the bootsector. NT then takes the modified bootsector and modifies that and points to that location. If you would install NT and then Win9x; NT would be pointing to the old bootsector and one of the OSs should not work.

I also agree that maybe you should modify the Filesystem layout with partition magic.
Note: That if you want to access any applications that you are currently using in your win98 environment you will need to re-install each one.

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