Question On Preparing 2 Hard Drives For Dual Boot
Oct 20, 2009
I just have a question regarding installation of Windows 7 to dual boot with XP.
Am planning on doing a clean install on two new SATA hard drives. Will first attach one drive and partition and format it when I install XP.
Should I then go ahead and attach the second drive and partition and format it using XP before I start my installation of Windows 7?
Or, would it be better to attach the second drive and then partition and format it when I install Windows 7? Am thinking that the second approach would be better. By the way, this forum is a great resource.
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Dec 6, 2011
I have a M2010 running Windows 7 ultimate using raid. I was wondering if I put in a hd in the secondary spot if I could add XP Pro and dual boot. I have some things that work better under XP. I put my old laptop drive in and set the bios raid to auto detect/ata. It booted to 7 and installed drive E:. I didn't change any Matrix software settings so it's a raid/non raid setup.
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Jun 7, 2011
I know at this point it's tricky and i should have done it before installing Windows 7 however...My new physical primary drive now has Windows 7 pro running exclusively the whole partition (cI'd like to add the drive that had XP pro running on the same PC.i'd like to get this running as a duel boot without corrupting the XP drive.
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May 19, 2010
1st. Installed XP on IDE drive, 2nd. installed a Sata drive, installed Windows 7 on that drive, want to remove the IDE drive, is it as simple as disconnecting the XP drive and do a startup repair, or is there going to be an issue with the XP drive being the Active drive, will startup repair make the Sata drive the Active drive?
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Nov 26, 2009
I want to install 7 on a separate hard drive to see how it works & work indepenantly on it's own system. How can I if at all make it so when I am booting up I can toggle in between 7 & xp startups.
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Dec 1, 2009
i have xp home 32 bit as my OS now and i have another hard drive installed and ready to install win 7 64 bit on to. can i do this with xp running or should i disconnect the HD with xp on it, then when i start the computer it won't see any OS and then i could boot from the win7 dvd and do a clean installl and then re=connect the HD with xp on it.
then when i start computer i should get the choice of which one to boot from or is this not the way to do it?? i want the OS's on separate HD's for now as i am sure that not everything that i want to run will work on the 64 bit win7 until i can afford to get all the programs i use to work on win7.
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Jan 6, 2010
I currently have windows 7 ultimate in a Dell Gx270 P4 2.6ghz I know its old. And i want to Install Windows XP in another hard drive i have, but how do i make both hard drives boot, so i can select which one i want to boot.
I'm doing this because XP mode doesn't work in this computer. And i don't want to partition.
Most information i find in google requires partitioning and i don't want that.
If you know how please post it, or post the Links where i can find it.
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Feb 4, 2011
dual booting windows 7 home premium x64 with linux fedora 14 on dual independantly dedicated drives. i am a college student with moderate computer (windows) knowledge but am doing software development and would like to play around with some linux for a class. i have no prior experience with linux and have minimal knowledge of operation. i am currently running windows 7 and would like to keep it as my primary os. i do not wish to share media files across drives or os's, windows does that just fine as is and i dont want to get into a third drive. my current drive is a 1tb wd black caviar hdd. it is also currently 2/3rds full and the desktop is about 6 months old so i would rather not partition the drive for a dual boot. i would think that there are some other advantages for the os's operating independantly off their own drives other than if one hdd dies i should still have the other with its os still ok. i have read some topics about RAID configs with dual boot setups with dual drives like this but am not very familiar with RAID. is there a RAID config that would be beneficial in this situation? i currently do not have a RAID card. my tower internals are not very accessible and i dont like the idea of disconnecting drives depending on which os i want to operate.
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Aug 28, 2010
Here's my situation: I use 32-bit Windows 7, however, once per month I need to use 64-bit Windows 7. So I would like to install 64-bit Windows 7 to another drive. However, I don't want to see the dual boot menu on every restart. I only want to temporarily switch to 64-bit by pressing F8 (or whatever) to change booting device at bootup.
What's the proper way to do this?
Many years ago I used to have a situation where I had WinXP on one drive and WinXP on other drive. I could switch my C: (with WinXP) at bootup. It worked, except there was a problem: In some situations C:Windows and D:Windows or Programs Files were getting mixed up, automatically Start Menu pointed suddenly to D:Program Filessomething without asking me. I had used a clone software to clone the drive so that might be the reason why they mixed up together. Eventually removing the other drive might've crippled the system even my intention was to have two separate operating systems, just in one computer.
Basically I would like to have two C: drives with Windows 7-32bit and Windows 7-64bit. So in case one drive breaks, I'll have a very quick backup system ready.
Is it a stupid idea to disconnect the current C: drive and then install the new Windows to C: and then put the first drive in as well? Then I wouldn't have the dual boot menu, which might be what I want.
Is it possible to hide the dual boot menu, have it load 32-bit as default but still have a possibility to bring up the dual boot menu by pressing some key at bootup? In that case, is it possible to remove either drive and still boot up without problems?
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Jul 14, 2009
hp providian has two 512meg hdd's I have vista 32bit installed on one hdd
Would like to install windows 7 64 bit on the other hdd as a dual boot.
Never done dual boot before. there are some programs on the second hdd it
only has one partition. Can I just install it on that drive as is and still have the
programs remain,or do I have to split the drive into 2 partitions?
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Jul 31, 2010
I've already done with Dual Boot Windows XP and Windows 7. Initially i created 75GB of Raw partition when XP was installed.
1. When I goto XP my OS folder location is C:Windows and Windows 7 folder location I:Windows
2. When I go to Windows 7 my OS drive is C:Windows and Windows XP drive is D:Windows....
Currently, I'm not facing any problems, But wanted to know how & why its happening like that...??
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Dec 6, 2009
Is there an easy way to dual boot on separate drives, i have installed windows 7 on 1 drive & vista on another. This was done independenly on the same machine as to say put vista on last year the got another hard drive took the vista drive out put new hard drive in & installed windows 7.I connected both. they see each other.I have read lots about reinstall one OS but nothing on if its already installed. IS THERE AWAY?
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Dec 21, 2010
I'd like to set up two separate Windows 7 installations on my computer. I don't know whether this is possible, I know I can set up a dual-boot environment with an older version of Windows or Ubuntu. I have an OEM version of Windows 7 - is it possible to have the computer prompt me for which drive to boot?
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Jul 26, 2012
dual boot windows 7 on two drives. how can i uninstall one
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Jul 26, 2012
dual boot windows 7 on two drives. how can i uninstall one
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Oct 10, 2012
My hard drive crashed. Bought a new one. Cloned another hard drive onto it. Old computer won't recognize the cloned drive but does in BIOS. I think the CPU was destroyed while cleaning the dust because it has prongs that clamped down and I couldn't see exactly where the gold pins were going to set in. Was very careful, but either the CPU is bad or the mother board is bad. Tested all other components in the working computer. Battery is fine. New cloned hard drive is fine. So I installed the cloned drive as a second OS drive in the working computer.I now have to share the computer with my husband until I get a new CPU or MB for my better, more expensive computer.Is it possible for him to log into "his" computer using "his" 1TB Sata HD, and then for me to come along and log into the cloned drive in his computer (2TB Sata HD) and do all of my work from that drive, so that when my own computer gets fixed, I'll have all the files I've worked on and programs installed that only I need on it and ready for use in my own computer, taking it out of my husband's computer after mine is fixed?
I'm sure I can go into BIOS and change the boot order whenever either one of us sits down to use the computer, but he's not going to want to do that each time, being pretty much computer illiterate as he is. Is there some other way to do a user switch easily during any time of the day when we need to share his computer?.
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Mar 4, 2012
I currently have Windows 7 installed on two separate drives in my box. I can only set (select) boot sequence in the BIOS. If I recall correctly, way back when a boot selection menu would appear when I think I was running Windows 7 (when it first came out) alongside XP but that screen no longer appears with my current setup. Is there a way to get that screen back, or an alternate way to select the OS of choice without the hassle?
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Jan 8, 2012
I have RAID 0 on two hardrives booting up 64 bit Win 7 running as SATA 0 and SATA 1.I have a third drive on SATA 2 from my previous Dell XPS which booted 32 bit Windows XP. How can I set up the system to give me a choice of either system?lthough Win 7 64 bit is faster, many of the 32 bit XP software programs will not run very well on Win 7 and in addition Win 7 doesn't allow the setting of of shortcuts the way XP does which means that Win 7 inevitably requires two key strokes to XP's one stroke.
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Sep 22, 2012
I have read that using a computer specifically for financial transactions with known and trusted entities (such as a bank) is a good way to reduce (though not eliminate) the risk of your accounts being hacked by reducing the likelihood of inadvertently installing a malware, spyware, or virus by reducing internet sites visited. Assuming this is correct, I was wondering about dual booting one computer with two physical hard drives (each with its own OS) versus one hard drive with two partitions. I figure the former would be "more secure" since one drive would be isolated from any unwanted programs. However, since they shared a few things (motherboard and such), is this set up as "secure" as having two computers? If so, how does one go about setting up a dual boot with two separate hard drives of the same operating system using one computer?
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Nov 4, 2009
I have Windows 7 64-bit and Windows XP installed on 2 different disks. Unfortunately, when i installed one, the other hard drive was not connected.
Hence, the default dual boot option would not come along.
Now, I have to choose to boot from either of the HDD from the BIOS setup.
Is there a way i could attach my XP bootloader to Windows 7 boot loader?
I remember seeing somewhere that Windows 7 boot loader has a notion of supporting XP boot as well.
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Mar 3, 2011
I have separate ide drives one is installed with XP Pro and the other with windows 7. I want to have the choice of either os when the pc boots i.e. choose the drive to boot the pc.
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Dec 13, 2010
I have Window XP installed on Drive C:. My son installed Windows 7 on Drive E:. However, when the computer is booted up, it boots up in Windows 7, without allowing a choice. I suspect this can be corrected in BIOS, but don't want to screw it up.
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Nov 20, 2009
I have a hp dv 6000 i was trying to dual boot my pc with win 7 and xp pro, with win 7 installed first. in order to install xp i had to disable my sata native. I can dual boot but on my xp its seem I'm missing alot of drives. I have no internet or sound,
any suggestions?
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Aug 12, 2011
Originally I had a small solid-state hard drive on this set up. I added a non-solid-state hard drive later. Recently, my solid-state drive, the C Dr., became too full to upgrade certain software programs such as Dragon NaturallySpeaking. I purchased a second solid-state hard drive.I "mirrored" that second solid-state hard drive. To make sure that Windows was operating appropriately, I rebooted and hit F10. I then showed the new solid-state hard drive. Everything booted perfectly and the new solid-state hard drive was noted as the C Dr.When I rebooted into bios to change the hard drive boot order so that the new second solid-state hard drive would be the first in the priority, when I highlighted it and exited from it,it still showed the original solid-state hard drive as the first hard drive.I have never had this problem before. I now have to go into F10 every time I boot into my computer and highlight the new solid-state hard drive.
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Jun 24, 2012
i have two hard drives:A 250gb and a 1TBWhen I installed windows I chose the 1TB, but just left my other in there as it had some files I wanted on it. Now when I try to remove the 250gb drive, windows will not boot up.I tried marking the 250gb drive as inactive, but then during boot up it would say bootmgr is missing, so i had to use the installation disk then mark as active again.
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Nov 5, 2010
I just want to delete the MBR on both my hard drives. Why? Because I want to. I'm going to delete my MBD and then I'm going to do a quick format of both of my whole hard drives. That's all I want to do.Will not give a clear direct answer to HOW THE @&$* DO I DELETE MY MASTER BOOT RECORD.I DONT HAVE FDISK. I DONT KNOW WHERE TO DOWNLOAD FDISK! I TRIED FDISK COMMANDS ON A COMMAND PROMPT - NOT RECOGNIZED!f anyone here can just tell me in the most simple way how to delete the master boot record on both hard drives...I can't believe there is no utility to do this...should be a utility called "Delete MBR" in my honest opinion.
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Sep 13, 2012
I have a brand new Sony SVT13112FXS - hard drive is a hybrid of 500 GB HDD and 32 GB SDD.I was attempting to reformat it to get all of the anti-virus stuff off, except when I tried to reformat no disks were shown in the reformat tool. It asked for drivers, so I assumed I'd need to install the SATA/chipset drivers. I downloaded them from the Sony website but it wouldn't allow me to install them (from a flash drive). Specifically the error is "No drives were found. Click load driver to provide a mass storage driver for installation."In my troubleshooting I (stupidly) marked the wrong partition as active and got the dreaded "bootmgr is missing" upon restart. I attempted to repair using the windows 7 disk as a recovery tool and selected "startup repair" 3 times, but it still does not work.I am able to get into command prompt and I am assuming I can inactivate the (wrong) active partition there. However, when I go into DISKPART and type "list disk", all that shows up is my flash drive that I am attempting to install windows from - the computers hard drive does NOT show up here.I will also happily completely reformat instead of repairing, but I cannot do that since I can't get the disks to show up in the reformat tool.
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Oct 23, 2009
I currently have a system running XP with two IDE hard drives and 3 partitions.
I have taken Windows 7 as a chance to get myself some much needed extra space! and purchased a new 1tb SATA drive.
I really dont want to lose the exisitng data I have so my original plan was to take my main IDE harddrive with most of my data stick it in an external USB carrier and then start fresh in the system with the 1tb and Windows 7.
What would be cooler would be if I could add the 1tb to the exisiting system and install Windows 7 on that (ideally with that as C and either then have much quicker access to transfer data to the new drive or even dual boot with XP at first incase I have any issues with Windows 7. Can anyone advice me on how easy/risky this is? And what they would suggest to someone trying to maximise the uptime of their PC?
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Dec 30, 2009
I have a Dell Inspiron 1440 laptop with Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit. Some of my older applications do not support this platform. My processor does not support Window Virtual PC and Windows XP mode so I was hoping to add XP as a dual boot. Is it possible to boot XP from an external harddrive or USB instead of having to partition the internal hard drive. Or do you have any suggestions on how I can load XP after Windows 7 is already loaded.
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May 1, 2009
can I dual boot using an ext. Hard drive. I found an old 250gb phanton hd I've never used. Figured I could throw it in there. Would vista dual boot to that. Or no??
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Sep 7, 2009
I have a 300gb harddrive that i shrank by 50gb to make room for a windows 7 rc1 32 bit dual boot. I now need to extend the partition because i have almost filled it up. When i shrink the main partition (the 238gb one) that has vista on it, it won't let me extend the windows 7 partition onto it.
This is what it looks like in diskmgmt.msc
Vista (188gb)/Unallocated space (~50gb)/Windows (50gb)/HP_RECPVERY (9.91gb)
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