Windows 7 - Another 7 and XP Dual Boot Question

I stumbled into this forum this morning, while researching dual booting with two hard drives, and this looks like a great forum. I see there are a lot of questions about dual booting, but after reading through some of them, I'm still not sure what works for me.

I just ordered a new mb, i5, hd, memory, and Windows 7, and should have it early next week. I will be removing my WD 500GB Blue, which has XP SP3 on it, from my MSI i650 when I make the changeover.

My plan to date is to assemble the new system, install the XP hd and see what happens.

Will I need to do a clean install of XP? A repair install?

After XP is installed and booting, I would then install the new hd and in the bios set the new hd as the primary, and install Windows 7.

Somehow, this sounds too easy to me.

Do I need to install Windows 7 first?

I would like to have Windows 7 as my C drive, and XP as my H drive. Right now my XP hd is my H drive.

It is my understanding that in order to select which OS will boot, one must make the selection in the BIOS, but from what I have read, it sounds like there are other options.

I'm a bit of a greenhorn, so understanding formatting and partitions is not one one of my strengths.

If anyone could explain the process in laymen's terms, I would greatly appreciate it__Thanks

Welcome to Seven Forums, 007vsMagua.

There are a couple of ways to do this, depending on what you want the final system to look like/do.

If you want a clean XP and Windows 7 both available, I would put the old XP drive in and do a clean install of XP first. Once that is up and running, then boot from the DVD and do a "Custom" install of Windows 7.

With the two drives in the machine, it should ask you where you want Windows 7 to go. Indicate the new drive, and it will set up a dual boot menu for you.

That's probably the easiest way to go. If you want some other sort of lash-up, please post back and the folks here will figure out how to do it.

P.S. - Here's a tutorial that may be helpful - Dual Boot Installation with Windows 7 and XP

(scroll down in it to the part about two drives.)

Thanks for the reply TheSchaft. The tutorial link is directed toward dual booting from one HD with partitian. It's a nice tutorial, be nice if he did one for two HD's. The web is full of information on partitioning one HD, but few, and conflicting, directions on doing it with two HD's.

What if I don't want to do a clean install of XP...just plug it in and use as is?

Welcome to Seven Forums.

If you scroll down on the tutorial TheSchaft mentioned you will see
It is required to have both HDs connected to get the dual boot setup.

When you get your new HD, install it, start your computer, it will detect the new hardware and ask you to initialize and partition it. Setup the partitions as you prefer, then mark the partition you want to install Windows 7 on as Active before you install Windows 7.

Take a few minutes to decide if your going to want to keep XP as a dual boot option. It is easy to setup but, can be difficult to remove XP from the boot manager and still be able to boot to Windows 7. We have seen a lot of issues with removing XP from the boot manager.

If you just want to keep it for a short time, you might consider booting it from BIOS.

You can try to just plug in the XP HD and see if it works, but when you install a new processor and motherboard, you will need to re-install XP.

If you are going to dual boot, install XP first and then Windows 7.

Thanks for the reply Dave. There is more to the tutorial than what I first believed, and the extended thread should prove to be very helpful.

I talked to a friend yesterday, who has a lot of experience with builds, and this is what he told me to do.

1-) Assemble the new computer with all hardware attached...

2-) In the BIOS select the XP drive to boot first...

3-) Activate XP if needed...restart computer...

4-) In the BIOS select the DVD drive to boot first...

5-) With Windows 7 in the DVD drive...boot...

6-) Windows 7 will take care of partitions and formatting...

Is that it in a nut shell?

That is precisely the way to do it.

Sorry for the delay in responding - too nice outside.

Thanks...I came across this article today at Microsoft and they seem to suggest doing a repair install of XP, so that the "Setup installs the HAL, the IDE controller drivers, and any other drivers that the new motherboard must have." Any thought on this...

It was also a beautiful day here too...

Your friend suggests doing a repair install of XP so that it reconfigures the drivers since it was in another machine previously. This sometimes works.

Think hard about whether you really want a dual boot. Problem is, you may not be sure - but we are seeing many who have set up dual boots and then bailed out within hours or days once they experience 7. It is never that easy to do.

Consider installing Windows 7 to your new HDD with only it plugged in, then choosing which HDD (XP or Windows 7) to boot by using the BIOS boot order shortcut key (normally f10) at bootup. This makes the other HDD a data drive when not booted. And it makes unplugging XP or formatting it for later use as a data drive very simple.

If you really want a dual boot, then you'll want both drives plugged in and to install Windows 7 last in order so that it configures the boot menu properly.

007vsMagua - I think gregrocker has hit it. What is it you want to do with the dual boot? Once I installed Windows 7 (the RC), I never looked back. All my XP programs worked, as did some from as far back as 1999 (Micro CD Burner - no longer around except at my site and a few others).

The point here is what does a dual boot buy you? It really sounds like a good option would be to load Windows 7 on the new HD and see if you really need XP. If you do, you can always go back to your friend's scenario.

Thank you for the wise advice. My young friend (Ben) built my system 20 months ago, and my intention was to use the computer for the internet, photoshop, video editing, word, excel, media center, etc. At the time I had no interest in gaming, but Ben, who is a lifelong gamer, got me interested in games, and I have been an avid fan ever since.

I'm an older man with only about two years of experience on a computer. I have replaced my gpu, ps, cooler, and memory, and this will be my first full build.

In discussions with Ben, he is of the belief that DX9 games play better on XP, than on Vista, so he uses a multi-boot system, with XP 32bit for DX9 games, and Vista 64bit for DX10 games. Early reviews do show that Windows 7 performs a little better than Vista with DX10 titles, but does that mean Windows 7 will handle DX9 games better than XP? (I need to do some research on that) In our conversations, I have come away with the belief that multi-boot systems, while not the norm, are also not unusual.

XP would be for playing my collection of DX9 titles, and I would probably keep Word, Excel, and my Home Design programs on XP.

Another reason I would like to do a multi-boot system is so that I can do a slow migration to Windows 7.

I would really like to do a multi-boot system, as long as I should be able too, but the last two posts sound a little discouraging, and I get the idea that there is no standard, tried and true, installation procedure. Are Windows operating systems designed to be used in multi-boot configurations? If there are problems now, could they be fixed with the first service pack?

It's a learning process_Dennis