Help needed to dual boot Vista & XP - Overclock.net

leimrod · 07-19-07

Ok here's my dilemma and i'm not really sure if there is any solution to it, but I thought if anyone would know, you's helpful chaps would

Ok so I have a 600GB RAID 0 set up (should be 640GB but I lost 40GB to formatting). Its split into 3 partitions, 140GB for XP, 260GB for Vista 64bit, 200GB for media.

I installed XP first, then Vista second. Problem is the XP partition is set as drive c: in Vista and I can't change it. So whenever Vista installs something automatically, it defaults to drive c: and installs it on my XP partition.

This is far from ideal as i'm going to be getting rid of XP at some stage when i'm happy enough with Vista. But I won't be able to if Vista is installing files it needs to run on the c: drive

So what are my options here, i'd like to keep both OS's completely seperate and have each represented as being installed on the c: drive when I boot into each. Is this possible?

If not, what are some other options I could look into? All help appreciated and i'll dish out rep+'s accordingly

this n00b again · 07-19-07

are you sure?

i am also dual booting.

and when i boot up in to windows xp, my xp drive is labeled as c: and my vista drive is not c:

but when i boot up in to vista, my vista drive is labeled c: and my xp drive is something different.

they are both installed on the same drive just different partition, so in order to keep it straight i labeled the xp partition to XP PRO.

yes everytime i install something it defaults to c: drive in both OS, but i dont' worry about it because they default to their own drive. although im not sure of this is suppose to happen, it does for me

in the bios of course the drives are labeled permanetly.

Villainstone · 07-19-07

You may want to get a hold of partition magic and see if that will help you out. I;m not sure if there is an option in the program to change drive letter's but it maybe worth a shot. What really seems strange to me is that my dual boot named the drives accordingly as needed.

leimrod · 07-19-07

Quote:

Originally Posted by this n00b again

yes everytime i install something it defaults to c: drive in both OS, but i dont' worry about it because they default to their own drive. although im not sure of this is suppose to happen, it does for me

in the bios of course the drives are labeled permanetly.

this is a known problem with dual booting. How did you install the OS's? Did you install XP first or second?

this n00b again · 07-19-07

i installed vista first, then i installed xp.

i used vista boot pro for the dual booting. i've seen other people dual boot and not have this happen to them, but it happens to me.

im using x64 vista business
and x86 windows xp pro sp2

Skullzaflare · 07-19-07

Quote:

Originally Posted by leimrod

this is a known problem with dual booting. How did you install the OS's? Did you install XP first or second?

you can tell vista where to install the files, just like on xp. it should be under diskmanagement, right click the your main partition, change drive letters and paths, try and set it up there. thats about as far as i go as ive never had this problem

edit-do this under vista

this n00b again · 07-19-07

i googled around and i found:
http://apcmag.com/5485/dualbooting_vista_and_xp

he talks about having the install problem with the c:.........
but he doesn't go on to address it.

he simply uses easy bcd to change the drive partition letters, (this may be help to you if you want to change your vista partition to c:.

Quote:

When the system reboots it won’t bring up a boot menu. Although XP recognises the Vista partition it doesn’t recognise Vista itself.

The Windows XP bootloader gets installed to the MBR and Vista can no longer boot.

When XP loads, open up Windows Explorer and you’ll see something interesting – a C: and (in this case) an E: drive.

The C: drive contains Windows Vista, and as Windows XP can read NTFS partitions, it can browse and modify Vista’s file structure.

More importantly, applications which have installation paths hard-coded into their install scripts rather than using Windows system parameter variables could easily dump files into C: when they should be installing to E:. This isn’t such a great situation.

leimrod · 07-19-07

Quote:

Originally Posted by Skullzaflare

you can tell vista where to install the files, just like on xp. it should be under diskmanagement, right click the your main partition, change drive letters and paths, try and set it up there. thats about as far as i go as ive never had this problem

edit-do this under vista

i've already tried this under vista, it doesn't work, Vista won't allow me to format the c: drive because it says it contains the paging file.

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Help needed to dual boot Vista & XP

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