Can I dual-boot XP and Vista in two seperate Hard Drives?

[kman79]

I currently have XP Pro running on one hard drive, and I just formatted the other drive that I used for storage. I just received my copy of Vista Ultimate and would like to install it on a different hard drive just in case I have second thoughts about it. I would really like to be able to keep my good install of XP untouched, so I need help on making sure I can do a clean install on the separate drive and be given a choice on which OS to boot up from. I apologize for such a noob question, but I do appreciate everyone help.

 

[jonesthewine]

Yes, you can do it. The absolute safest way would be to phjysically connect the drive that you want to boot from and disconnect the drive that you do not want to boot from. This means having wasy access to the inside of your computer, of course. Just connect power to the boot drive and pull the power connector from the other. I did this durign the Vista beta tests.

 

[kman79]

Sounds easy enough.

Do I have to change anything in the BIOS at all when I unplug the drive, or does the BIOS know to boot from which ever drive is powered?

 

[jonesthewine]

Originally posted by: kman79
Sounds easy enough.

Do I have to change anything in the BIOS at all when I unplug the drive, or does the BIOS know to boot from which ever drive is powered?

Just be sure to plug/unplug when powered off and you're good to go. As long as your BIOS is set to boot from HDD it will work.

 

[kman79]

Thanks, I'll give that a try, I appreciate the help

 

[shekondar]

You can also select which drive to boot from in the BIOS - that way you can still access files on the old drive.

 

[Doh!]

No need to open the case & disconnect the cables at boot everytime.

At boot, you should have an option to choose the boot drive by pressing "F8" (maybe different for your motherboard but most modern motherboards have set them F#, look at the message at the bottom of the BIOS post screen).

 

[Markbnj]

You absolutely do not need to disconnect the drive. Just create a partition on the second drive for Vista, or use an existing partition on that drive. Run the Vista install and tell it to install to that partition. It will notice that XP is on another (the active) partition, and will install BCD entries for XP. Then at startup you will be given a menu asking which operating system to run. I've had mine set up exactly this way for months now.

 

[kman79]

Originally posted by: Markbnj
You absolutely do not need to disconnect the drive. Just create a partition on the second drive for Vista, or use an existing partition on that drive. Run the Vista install and tell it to install to that partition. It will notice that XP is on another (the active) partition, and will install BCD entries for XP. Then at startup you will be given a menu asking which operating system to run. I've had mine set up exactly this way for months now.

That sure would be more convenient. I just went ahead and backed up all my important files from the windows install. I can try this method out, and I wouldn't be too dissapointed if by some chance it does not work the same on my machine as it did on yours. I hope it does though, thanks.

 

[exaltair]

Yes, dual booting as described will work. However, you should have XP installed first on one partition, then Vista on another. (I had Vista installed first on one, and the Bootup was messed up after I installed XP)

 

[Markbnj]

Originally posted by: exaltair
Yes, dual booting as described will work. However, you should have XP installed first on one partition, then Vista on another. (I had Vista installed first on one, and the Bootup was messed up after I installed XP)

That's a very good point. I only tried it the one way, i.e. with XP installed first, and I expect most people will be in that situation. I have read of people having issues installing XP second, but I don't think those issues should be too hard to resolve using BCDEDIT in Vista.

 

[jim1976]

Originally posted by: exaltair
(I had Vista installed first on one, and the Bootup was messed up after I installed XP)

So what can you do in this case? I describe my problem here

 

[Boyo]

Originally posted by: Markbnj
You absolutely do not need to disconnect the drive. Just create a partition on the second drive for Vista, or use an existing partition on that drive. Run the Vista install and tell it to install to that partition. It will notice that XP is on another (the active) partition, and will install BCD entries for XP. Then at startup you will be given a menu asking which operating system to run. I've had mine set up exactly this way for months now.

How big are your partitions for each OS?

 

[WT]

In the same boat here with my setup. I have 2 160gb drives with one set up in XP and the other getting a fresh copy of Vista Business on it. My only concern is the hard drive shuffle that Vista does reassigning drve letters.

 

[Markbnj]

Originally posted by: Boyo

Originally posted by: Markbnj
You absolutely do not need to disconnect the drive. Just create a partition on the second drive for Vista, or use an existing partition on that drive. Run the Vista install and tell it to install to that partition. It will notice that XP is on another (the active) partition, and will install BCD entries for XP. Then at startup you will be given a menu asking which operating system to run. I've had mine set up exactly this way for months now.

How big are your partitions for each OS?

I set aside 50 gigs for Vista on a 400 gig drive. XP is on a 74 gig Raptor.

In the same boat here with my setup. I have 2 160gb drives with one set up in XP and the other getting a fresh copy of Vista Business on it. My only concern is the hard drive shuffle that Vista does reassigning drve letters.

I haven't seen that cause any problems. Vista reshuffles the drive assignments because it sees itself as being on C:, while XP sees the same thing when it boots. But it hasn't caused any issues, since I am only using apps installed under XP when I am in XP, and likewise in Vista. I did set up Outlook to use a common folder file, but just using the right drive letter as it appears in each OS took care of that.

 

[corkyg]

Two separate drives is not really "dual boot," - it is choice boot. The best way to do that is to install a mobile rack in your PC, then have two trays with the two hard drives. One is Vista and the other XP - or Linux - or anything else.

You simply choose which to use, put that drive in the rack and power up.

A few years ago, a company called Romtec made switching circuitry that allowed you to electronically switch between drives - but they and their TRIOS products have gone away. Too bad - I used it and it worked.

Trios

 

[Billb2]

If you have XP on a boot drive and install Vista on another drive, Vista will install it's boot loader on the original boot drive. Uninstalling (erasing?) Vista will not delete this new boot loader, which will now give you the choice of booting a non-existant OS...forever.

Thee are editors available to modufy the Vista boot loader and you "could" modify it so that the Vista install doesn't show as a choice, set the wait time to 1 sec or so and just blow through it..but that's really a klunge, isn't it?

The only way to do truly "separate" installs is to remove the original boot drive and install Vista (or any other OS for that matter) on another drive and swap out the drives as the method of choosing which OS to boot. But that won't last long as it's a real PITA.

 

[WT]

I haven't seen that cause any problems. Vista reshuffles the drive assignments because it sees itself as being on C:, while XP sees the same thing when it boots

Mark, my only problem with this setup as it stands is with United Devices (distributed computing app). I have it running at startup in XP, and when I boot into Vista RC1 (installed onto the second HD as an S: drive), it will crap out trying to send the update to the UD servers. My guess is that Vista is re-assigning the app to the C: drive and causing a conflict wth the XP United Devices folder.

It really does make for a best of both worlds setup, but right now I'm waiting to load retail Vista on the PC until I can upgrade the PC to a C2D setup.

 

[Markbnj]

Originally posted by: corkyg
Two separate drives is not really "dual boot," - it is choice boot. The best way to do that is to install a mobile rack in your PC, then have two trays with the two hard drives. One is Vista and the other XP - or Linux - or anything else.

You simply choose which to use, put that drive in the rack and power up.

A few years ago, a company called Romtec made switching circuitry that allowed you to electronically switch between drives - but they and their TRIOS products have gone away. Too bad - I used it and it worked.

Trios

That might be a good solution, although you seem to want to make it more complicated and expensive than it needs to be. I don't agree with your definition, though. It's certainly dual boot, because the loader has to switch active partitions. I don't really see why it makes a diff. that the two partitions are on separate physical drives.

 

[zodder]

Vista will not delete this new boot loader, which will now give you the choice of booting a non-existant OS...forever.

format /mbr?

 

[kman79]

Thanks for the replies everyone.

I'm at work right now, so I haven't done the install yet. Like I said earlier, I have transfeered and backed up all files I need on to my Western Digital MyBook.

I do have a question though, can I or should I install Vista during boot up? Or should I install it while in XP? I'm not sure if it makes a difference, but this is pretty much the only question that I have left unanswered before I jump the gun.

 

[Markbnj]

I would do it from boot up. The only restriction is that if you want to upgrade XP you have to run the setup from within XP. Since you don't want to do that, just boot off the Vista DVD.

 

[aka1nas]

You might as well install Vista at bootup. I am running a similar setup as Mark, with a 74GB raptor for XP, a 250GB drive for Vista 64, and a 640GB RAID 0 that both OSes are sharing.

When you multi-boot Windows versions, always install the older OS first, then work your way towards newer OSes. If you wanted to do this with a Linux distribution, you would do all the Windows versions first, then Linux afterwards.

 

[corkyg]

To make it "el cheapo" using two drives, install Vista on one and have XP on the other. Have both installed and connected using CSEL. Then just connect power to the drive you want to boot from.

Too bad we don't have simple front panel drive power selectors.

" I don't agree with your definition, though. It's certainly dual boot, because the loader has to switch active partitions. "

No - when you have separate OS's on separate drives, the loader doesn't switch. It only sees one drive and one loader. You choose which.

 

[seipheroth]

I actually disconnected one of my hard drives before installing Vista on the other drive. I had a crummy experience trying to remove Vista RC1, and had problems with boot up. Once I installed Vista, I plugged the second drive back in and now I just choose which drive to boot from in the BIOS.