The old dual-boot XP32/vista64 trick...

[looper]

See rig in "sig"...

*IF Asus sends me a new P5B-D to replace the fried one, the new one may not have the "1237" newest bios I had in the original MB...Will the OS, apps, and files on this original HD work w/ new MB?? OR, do I need to format that original HD and re-load everything anyway?

*If I get a second HD, the WD "Black" 640gig, and I do want Vista 64bit OS to run more than 4 gig of memory, BUT I want to retain XP for some old apps & games, how do I set up a dual-boot in this circumstance? Are both OS's going on the new HD, or XP on the older HD, and Vista64 on new HD? And, when comp started up, I will have option to go into either OS...?

 

[RebateMonger]

It's much safer and simpler to just put a single OS on a single hard drive. As long as they are both NTFS, for instance, you can still read the other hard drive after booting if you need data from it.

Motherboards almost all have the ability to choose which drive to boot at each bootup. Usually you hit the F12 key or such and it gives you a list of drives to boot from.

 

[mechBgon]

Another vote for keeping the two fully independent.

To do that, unplug your first hard drive, then install the second OS on the other hard drive while it's the only hard drive in the system. Afterwards you can plug in the first hard drive again, and on an Asus, it's the F8 key during POST to get the boot-device list. F12 works for Gigabyte, and I believe F10 works on Intel-branded boards.

 

[looper]

mechBgon...

If I get a different MB than the Asus I had originally (will prob be a Gigabyte GAEP45-UD3P) , I'll have to format/re-install WinXP and all apps on my existing hard drive that's in the box now, right?

Then, disconnect that HD, install the new WD hard drive, install new OS- Vista Home Ed 64bit...then 64 bit drivers for components, and then re-install apps...??

Getting this memory to replace what I had:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16820231166

 

[bruceb]

It all depends on if the motherboard chipset on the new board is the same as on the old motherboard. You can uninstall your drivers in Safe Mode, then run a Repair Install to let the OS redetect the new hardware and install the necessary drivers for it. This will usually work and would need to done for both your OS's. You can also use Sysprep to do basically the same job as it is intended for deploying 1 OS image onto many computers, each with different hardware & chipsets. I do not have experience using this, but others here should be able to point out the proper steps to follow.

 

[mechBgon]

Originally posted by: looper
mechBgon...

If I get a different MB than the Asus I had originally (will prob be a Gigabyte GAEP45-UD3P) , I'll have to format/re-install WinXP and all apps on my existing hard drive that's in the box now, right?

Then, disconnect that HD, install the new WD hard drive, install new OS- Vista Home Ed 64bit...then 64 bit drivers for components, and then re-install apps...??

That's the gameplan, yeah... do one install, unplug that drive, plug in the other drive, do the other install, then hook up the first drive again. It's only a little less convenient than a conventional dual-boot, and leaves both OSes fully independent so you can pull out either drive and still run the OS that's left.

Getting this memory to replace what I had:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16820231166

I recently bit the bullet and upgraded from my old nForce4 Ultra / Socket 939 dual-core to a Gigabyte EP45-UD3R, and I just grabbed a couple of 2 x 2GB Crucial DDR2 800 kits. If you don't need a lot of OC headroom, that would save you a few bucks.

The fascinating thing was that I had a dual-boot WinXP 32-bit / Vista x64 set up, and just for kicks, I tried booting them up on the new motherboard cold-turkey. That's not supposed to work, especially with completely different HDD controllers, but after a bunch of driver re-detection, both WinXP and Vista managed to boot up 😕 So if you want to give it a shot, there's nothing to lose.

 

[looper]

Thx for info and your patience with me, guys...

If Asus replaces for free the P5B-D(within 2 yr warranty), think I'll build another comp around it w/ spare components for my son... and I'll get the Gigabyte UD3P or the DQ6 as my new MB...which I really wanted to do anyway...didn't really care if Asus gave me a new MB or not...

Gigabyte DQ6 or UD3P....been hearing about instability OC'ing w/ 8 gig of ram in the UD3P...what do you guys think?