[jolt8me]

I just bought a new laptop with vista already installed. It did not come with an install disk because i guess customers cant be trusted with the things they buy. Anyway, i hate vista already after using it for a couple of days and was looking into making it dual boot with xp. I saw this tutorial on how to do it http://www.syschat.com/dual-boot-vis...6.html?garpg=2

The tutorial says "but Vista will recognize XP, so we need to remove the boot loader that XP just put in with the old Vista boot loader. So restart once more, but this time with your Vista disc in the drive."
but the problem is that I dont have a vista disc. I even asked the service guy and he said that they dont give disks like that anymore to people. That instead i should make a recovery disk. That isnt the same thing is it? What should i do besides taking it up the rear from microsoft and vista

[havensal]

You can dual boot Vista and XP.

Vista will be your default, I don't think you can change that change that.

I know it's easier to install XP and then Vista.

You will need to partition your HDD in order to dual boot, I don't think there is any way around that.

Being that you don't have any restore DVD's, you will have to find some software to partition without loosing any data.

Is your HDD large enough to have two full partitions and OS's? You will have 2 copies of all of your software. You can share your personal files, but I am unsure if you can use the same folders for "My Documents" and such.

If you install XP after Vista you will need to repair the Vista boot loader (?) in order to boot Vista. I will see if I can find the web page I used after I screwed up my PC.

I would recommend looking to see if you can make your own restore DVD's before you do anything. I had an HP that had a program that let you burn a set ONCE!

I hope This helps and not confuse you more.

[IndyGunFreak]

http://apcmag.com/how_to_dual_boot_v...step_guide.htm

Vista I believe has a partitioning tool w/ the OS... If not, PartedMagic is a good one, just be careful, and make sure you have a backup of all data. PartedMagic is a free live CD, so you'll have to burn it to a CD and boot it to use it.

http://partedmagic.com/

I dual boot Linux and XP, and here's how I set it up(might be easy to have a similar setup, if you have a lot of movies, music, etc, you want to share between the two.

1. XP - 20gigs
2. Linux - 30gigs
3. NTFS - 100gigs. This holds all my music, videos, etc, that can be shared between the two. Both OS's have access to this partition, so it works nicely for me.

Edit: I see the guide I gave you suggests Gparted... It will do the same thing, and also works well.

[BigSexy]

Do you have a reason you would want to run both Vista and XP in that manor?

A possible solution for you might be to install either as your base and run the other via VMware as a virtual machine. If you decide to try VMware, you might want to consider Linux as your base OS...depending on what you do with that box.

[jolt8me]

im not sure my windows xp disk will work all the way through. It has some scratches on it. So I cant reformat the entire hard drive and take a chanace. Since I dont have a vista dvd to install if that happens.
I have 2 hard drives on this computer. one holds vista and the other holds data. So could i put xp on the same hard drive as vista but break it up into 2 partitions? Plus since all the data is on the other hard drive would that mean that both os's could read from it and i wouldent have to have 2 copies of every program like a previous poster mentioned?

Originally Posted by BigSexy

Do you have a reason you would want to run both Vista and XP in that manor?

A possible solution for you might be to install either as your base and run the other via VMware as a virtual machine. If you decide to try VMware, you might want to consider Linux as your base OS...depending on what you do with that box.

[cs133atom]

Virtual PC w/XP and just leave it alone.

[jolt8me]

Originally Posted by cs133atom

Virtual PC w/XP and just leave it alone.

doesnt virtual pc only support windows xp 32bit editions. I would be installing 64bit because of the dual processors and because its a lot faster then 32bit xp.

[solomansousana]

My new dell vostro quad core came with dual boot xp sp3 and Vista home business 64 bit. They actually offered the duel operating systems. And when I unpacked the system, it came with both restore disks with manuals.