Quick dual boot screen question

masterjk

Ive installed xp onto a separate partition to win 7 on my laptop they are both set as primary partition, xp boots over win 7 with no dual boot screen, can i fix this using g parted??

matt-dublin

You need to change the boot.ini in the xp partition.

Question, instead of dual booting why didn't u use virtual pc??

Isnt dual booting a bit old now?

masterjk

matt-dublin wrote: »

You need to change the boot.ini in the xp partition.

Question, instead of dual booting why didn't u use virtual pc??

Isnt dual booting a bit old now?

That would probably make things easier..

1. Best virtual pc software?
2. Is the easiest way get rid of xp to format the partition in gparted?

matt-dublin

Your best bet would be to reinstall win 7, give the os partition 60gb space and leave the remainder of your personal storage.

When windows is reinstalled you can move your docs, pics, music, desktop etc folders to that partition.

Then just download Microsoft virtual pc or VMware player and install xp on that. Make sure intel virtualisation technology is turned on in your bios to get any additional performance outta the vm

masterjk

matt-dublin wrote: »

Your best bet would be to reinstall win 7, give the os partition 60gb space and leave the remainder of your personal storage.

When windows is reinstalled you can move your docs, pics, music, desktop etc folders to that partition.

Then just download Microsoft virtual pc or VMware player and install xp on that. Make sure intel virtualisation technology is turned on in your bios to get any additional performance outta the vm

is there a simpler way than reinstalling win7? can i just remove xp, if not its grand just gonna have to reinstall all the drivers which is a bit of hassle?

Fysh

Getting XP and 7 to co-exist in dualboot mode requires you to have installed in the right order - the WinXP master boot record can't invoke the Win7 bootloader, but the 7 master boot record can invoke XP's bootloader just fine.

Ie. if you install XP, then 7, you should be fine. If you installed XP after 7, you've probably overwritten your master boot record with the XP version.

If this is the case, see here for a fix.

If you've Win7 Pro you can download the XP Mode VM at no charge, might be easier. That said, you may find virtualised XP to be slower than a bare-metal install - plus if you're planning on using XP for games it may well not work.

masterjk

i found a program to get win7 to boot again easily on-line hopefully it works!

Fysh

masterjk wrote: »

i found a program to get win7 to boot again easily on-line hopefully it works!

Was it EasyBCD by any chance?

masterjk

Yeah thats the one!