I have a weird Question about file security

I didn't know where to put this so General seemed like the place.

I have 7 and XP installed and set up to dual boot.

Due to my housing circumstances I'm forced to share my computer with some of my roommates. I make them use the Guest Accounts.

My issue is that I can't access my XP files from my 7 installation. I have some stand alone programs that I'd like to just run off of my other HDD instead of copying to my windows 7 installation (I'm an idiot and made the partition very small).

Is there any way I can maintain the password protection, so they can't access my files, and still be able to access my files from each OS?

I technically can access them if I go through that whole security thing but I have a LOT of files.


Here's the layout:

160GB IDE: C: Windows XP Installation, Password Protected.
250GB SATA: O: 25Gb Partition for 7 installation, Password Protected.

I'd like to access files on C: from O: without having to remove the password from C:.

If it's not possible I'll just remove the password from XP and deal with it. They'll probably use Win7 anyway. I just don't want them being on an Admin account in case they go to dubious websites and get a virus. In a perfect world I could just password protect booting XP so that you can't boot XP unless you use a password but I don't think my BIOS can do that.

One solution could be that you use a third party encryption program that works both on XP and Win7 and encrypt the files. "Bcrypt" is an example - but you find a whole selection on the web.

whs said:

One solution could be that you use a third party encryption program that works both on XP and Win7 and encrypt the files. "Bcrypt" is an example - but you find a whole selection on the web.

I think that would work for keeping my files from them but the bigger issue is that I just don't want them to be able to use an Admin account for security reasons.

It's a moot point at the moment because I screwed up my dual boot somehow and I can't get XP to start. When I select XP it just resets the computer.

So you have a bigger problem. Apart from fixing your dual boot ( which I personally hate), you could run your Win7 in a virtual partition (I would use Virtual Box) with XP as the host. I run my Win7 like that on one machine with Vista as the host. Win7 works very well with only 1GB of RAM and 30GBs of disk allocated to the virtual partition. Plus you can switch back and forth between the 2 systems with 1 click.
A while ago I wrote a tutorial on how to do that which you find here: ( Tutorial: How to install Windows7 in a Virtual Partition « How-To Geek Forums ). It works equally well with XP as the host.

^Oh, too bad I didn't read that earlier.

I got my dual book working now.

My primary concern as of now is that I want to keep the password on my XP admin account but allow anyone to access my files. (I gave up on securing the files, I have nothing that needs to be secret etc.)

sagebrushfire said:

My primary concern as of now is that I want to keep the password on my XP admin account but allow anyone to access my files.

Just add "Everyone" to the security and sharing tabs of the folder.

sup3rsprt said:

sagebrushfire said:

My primary concern as of now is that I want to keep the password on my XP admin account but allow anyone to access my files.

Just add "Everyone" to the security and sharing tabs of the folder.

Hmm

I just changed the permissions.

I guess I had already made my folders private before I ever gave myself a password. Then I gave myself a password when I moved here. Having forgot about the file permissions change I assumed that giving yourself a password disables sharing your files with everyone.

Doh! *Smacks Head*