Window ME and Window XP multi boot

[jcdenton]

Hai guy, i'm using Window ME now and i plan to make a multi boot on my PC with Window ME plus Window Xp, can any one let me know how to do that, can i use bootmagic to do so???.Thanks You:D

[jema]

I think that when you install XP you will get a choice of where on the disk you want to install it, and if you choose not to overwrite ME, then multiboot will be created for you.

It certainly worked this way installing w2k.

jema

[mackerel]

Should be no probs dual-booting ME and XP, that's what I'm doing on my notebook at the moment.

As Jema says, choose a new install not the upgrade option. XP has its own boot manager which will let you choose which to boot so a third party utility isn't necessary.

[timiCom]

There are a few issues with dual boot and XP:-

Firstly if you upgrade over ME and you already have a reboot, you may find that XP wipes your boot.ini... Essentially - If you had say, win 2k on another partition, the winxp installer may wipe the reference to this boot option.

Once XP has installed, you may also not find boot.ini - the file which defines boot options. However microsoft claim this can be rebuilt using their restore tools - which may be manually added post install as another boot option at startup...

However, on my system the restore tool system would not even load.

I was forced to rebuild my boot.ini from an obscure option in control panel which finally gave me notepad and boot.ini - then I rewrote the boot entry for win2k. Miraculously (after finding out that partition numbering starts at 1 not "0", Win2k server booted up and I found all my work was not lost....

XP uses NTFS - but don't worry about this if you have Fat32 - it does a nice job of converting partitions to NTFS.


Lastly - if you find that Win XP gives you a <b>black screen</b> after the first reboot during install - and just hangs, and if you have a <b>Geforce2 card</b> - you may have to swap out your graphics card with something else just for install... This is a ridiculous fix but it works and it has happened to more people than just me... see http://www.computing.net/windowsxp/wwwboard/forum/4326.html .... I put in an ATI Rage 128 and the install was go - it just would not install with my geforce2 - but it does run with it!...

No such probs with Win2k - that installs very smoothly...
p.s. Mobo is Abit KT7a-RAID. Geforce2 is a Jetway MX200 running pretty recent detonator drivers. I thought it must have been RAID and the drivers for the HPT370, but nope, it was the Geforce....