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Dual Boot in Windows vista

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by euclidesmedici

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Hi all, I purchased a new laptop (HP 9500) and it'll bring Vista business 32bit. With this laptop I have room for two hard disk, I'm adding a new one where I need to install xp pro sp2.

Everything I've read about this topic recommends to install the Windows old version first and then the new one (vista). But what I'd like to do is to remove the original hard drive with vista, install the new one and run the xp installation, after that I'd insert the original disk with vista and Walla!! But I don't know if it will work. Any advice on my crazy ideas????

6 replies

by hal 9000

When you setup a Dual Boot system you get a starting screen asking you which OS you want to boot into you can not have 2 HDD with different OS installed and then add them to the same computer and expect them to work the way that you want them to.

Col

by Former member

You will not be able to Duel boot but you will still have access to your other drive through the bios settings under "boot settings".

by euclidesmedici

The point is that I don't want to lose the original configuration of my Vista OS. As you know these laptops bring a hidden partition where the restore point is located. I could install windows xp on the original disk but i'd lose the default setting that comes from factory. Any ideas?

by ic-it

YMMV. I believe this should work, but have not actually tried it. Basically you will use bcdedit from an elevated command prompt.
This KB article will help. Since you will have the install on a fresh drive, you should only need the section on bcdedit.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/919529
Let us know how well it worked for you.

by euclidesmedici

That's what i must do. Thank you very much for the info. I also found an app called VistaBootPRO_3.3.0. Have anything to say about it?

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