Can I dual boot with dual hard drives??

[azdevil]

I tried a couple of other forums, but was not getting much help. I have two hard drives, one has xp loaded on it the other has win2k, both are pro. Is there a way to dual boot, I have them both set to master on different channels, but only the primary will boot up. So, if I switch channels I can switch os's, but that is a pain in the arse.
Any suggestions,
Is it possible,
Do I have to reinstall both operating systems onto the same hard drive?
Please tell me there is a way.

 

[Brutuskend]

Yes.
I have Two Raid 0 arrays Tri booting 98SE (first partition one Raid Array #1)
Windows 2000 Pro (second raid array)
And XP Pro (second partition on raid arry #1)


You will have to go into the set-up program for either 2000 or XP and do a repair install, or repair the MBR using either install program.
It will setup a dual boot screen for you.

 

[charliebrown]

Your BIOS determines the boot order....

If you have different OS's on different hard drives, then at boot up, just go into the BIOS (hold down the delete key at startup) and set the First Boot Device to drive you want to boot from (either IDE-0 or IDE-1)....

Another suggestion - get a removable hard drive bay and keep different hard drives for Win2K, Win98, WinXP, Linux, etc. Just plug in whatever you want to use.

 

[azdevil]

Thanks guys,
I'll give that repair option a try, if not I will try the bios.

azdevil

 

[Brutuskend]

Here is everything you should need to know to set up your dual boot!

BTW: Google is good. Google is your friend!

 

[azdevil]

I did a search, though not on google.
I found the same article that said what I was doing was ok,
but it didn't really say what was next. I tried loading the computer from
the xp cd and I can use recovery to boot from the d drive, though it
asked for an admin password, I don't use one, and it wouldn't boot???

I did not see and option for choosing os position. There is a boot device choice.
I will try setting it to not iclude the primary ide at 0, and include only the hdd-1.

Then again, I am considering erasing my smaller hdd, 20 gig, and giving 10 to each os, and use the 40 gig for storage.

If I do that, I install 2000 first and I can use NTFS right??

 

[yakko]

My Biostar board allows me to choose the boot device after post.

 

[Brutuskend]

During the install the program should look your computer over for other OS's. Then by doing a MBR repair it should find and setup the other OS for dual booting. (At least I'm pretty sure thats how I went about setting mine up to Tri boot)

Also look here

And here

And lastly here if the repair console is not installed..