Dual Booting XP and XP

[Exahertz]

I need a dual boot of XP and XP,


One will be a fully operating OS and will be connected to the internet.
The other will be a stripped down, low or no bling, high preforming and will never be connected to the internet.


I was going to partition the disk into 3 parts

XP pro 1 - stripped (10gigs)
XP pro 2 - full (30gigs)
NTFS Storage (40gigs)

I was wondering if anyone knows of a place or any good examples that explain how to modify the bootstrap so i can select between both XP OS'es at startup?

also how do you open and edit the bootstrap?

[yatesy17]

what u mean whn u start the pc up .. u want to be able to pick what o/s u want to use .. it does tht anyway after u dualboot .. it jus goes on to a black screen then u pick which one u want to use

[Clint]

Pretty straightforward actually:

Install XP on first partition.
Boot from CD and install XP on second partition, and when first reboot choose second XP alternative.
Continue install of second XP.

After that you will automatically have two chioces when booting up.

In other words, Windows setup routine will take care of it for you.:up:

[jbartlett323]

and after installation to be able to tell the difference you can go into your boot.ini file and change the name of the os so you are not looking at "windows xp pro" twice...
to do so just right click on "My Computer" go to properties, then click the advanced tab and go to "Startup and Recovery" in the System startup area you will "edit"... this will allow you to edit your boot.ini... BE VERY CAREFULL!!! it sucks trying to recover that! Only change the name in quotes!!!
alternatively you can also show protected operating system files and it is at the root of c:
again be careful not to change anything else unless you know what you are doing... you can make it impossible to boot to either OS untill boot.ini is fixed!
anyway, Enjoy!! :up:

[Exahertz]

Cool, sounds easy.

Thanks!

[Exahertz]

Thanks all, everything worked as described! :D

[Clint]

and after installation to be able to tell the difference you can go into your boot.ini file and change the name of the os so you are not looking at "windows xp pro" twice...
to do so just right click on "My Computer" go to properties, then click the advanced tab and go to "Startup and Recovery" in the System startup area you will "edit"... this will allow you to edit your boot.ini... BE VERY CAREFULL!!! it sucks trying to recover that! Only change the name in quotes!!!
alternatively you can also show protected operating system files and it is at the root of c:
again be careful not to change anything else unless you know what you are doing... you can make it impossible to boot to either OS untill boot.ini is fixed!
anyway, Enjoy!! :up:

:up:

If you need more time to choose between the OS'es you can alter that in boot.ini as well.

[Exahertz]

Is there a way to select the order they are displayed?

because at the moment the stripped XP version is the first choice. if im not around my PC during the boot process then by default the stripped XP loads.

[jbartlett323]

Is there a way to select the order they are displayed?

because at the moment the stripped XP version is the first choice. if im not around my PC during the boot process then by default the stripped XP loads.

either in your boot.ini or in the directory i mentioned you just need to change your default operating system... try through the gui before going to the boot.ini... it wont change the visual order but it will change which OS boots

[Exahertz]

either in your boot.ini or in the directory i mentioned you just need to change your default operating system... try through the gui before going to the boot.ini... it wont change the visual order but it will change which OS boots

Thank you for the advise, that worked and was very easy!

also to change the visual order i just fliped these two lines without altering them in any way.

multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Lite" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect

Now i see "Microsoft Windows XP Professional" as the highlighted first choice on the top.

Thanks for helping me tweak that a little :up:

[jbartlett323]

Thank you for the advise, that worked and was very easy!

also to change the visual order i just fliped these two lines without altering them in any way.

multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Lite" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect

Now i see "Microsoft Windows XP Professional" as the highlighted first choice on the top.

Thanks for helping me tweak that a little :up:

Right on glad it helped you!! :yepp::up:
I thought that changing the physical order would change the visual but i was unsure and did not want to give you bad information! glad it worked good for you!!!