ChatterBank3 mins ago
Dual boot win 7 and XP
Can anybody help,
I am trying to put a dual boot system on my computer.
I have partitioned a 160G hard drive into nearly equal parts and installed Windows 7 on partition 1 but when I try to install Win XP Pro on partition 2 ,setting BIOS to read from CD ROM first, it just goes into Windows 7 and runs that ignoring the XP CD.
Also when I explore the CD in "My Computer" the install section is greyed out
What am I doing wrong?
Keithg
I am trying to put a dual boot system on my computer.
I have partitioned a 160G hard drive into nearly equal parts and installed Windows 7 on partition 1 but when I try to install Win XP Pro on partition 2 ,setting BIOS to read from CD ROM first, it just goes into Windows 7 and runs that ignoring the XP CD.
Also when I explore the CD in "My Computer" the install section is greyed out
What am I doing wrong?
Keithg
Answers
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Some BIOSs have an extra option "Boot from other devices" which needs to be enabled in addition to setting the boot order.
Having said that - I would have installed Win XP first and followed it up with Win 7 (in fact I did).
Having said that - unless you have some really esoteric software or some really ancient hardware, I really wouldn't bother with a dual-boot - just install 7 and be done with it.
Having said that - I would have installed Win XP first and followed it up with Win 7 (in fact I did).
Having said that - unless you have some really esoteric software or some really ancient hardware, I really wouldn't bother with a dual-boot - just install 7 and be done with it.
"Got to do all again to install XP first do you think that is the problem?"
Well at the boot point, the computer has no idea what operating systems are available, so the fact that Windows 7 is on the hard disk shouldn't affect the ability to boot with a CD.
Is it an original XP CD? If not, maybe it's just not a bootable CD. After all, presumably you booted with the 7 disk in order to install that.
Well at the boot point, the computer has no idea what operating systems are available, so the fact that Windows 7 is on the hard disk shouldn't affect the ability to boot with a CD.
Is it an original XP CD? If not, maybe it's just not a bootable CD. After all, presumably you booted with the 7 disk in order to install that.
"any ideas why the backup disk would not boot? " Nope, but it was a good guess wasn't it?
The reason I suggested installing XP first, is that (obviously) XP knows nothing of Win 7, whereas Win 7 knows what XP is. I figure that when installing Win 7, if it detects an XP partition it will know exactly what to do about creating a boot menu. XP may or may not...
The reason I suggested installing XP first, is that (obviously) XP knows nothing of Win 7, whereas Win 7 knows what XP is. I figure that when installing Win 7, if it detects an XP partition it will know exactly what to do about creating a boot menu. XP may or may not...
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