Windows 7 - Dual Boot Installation with Windows 7 and XP

**Brink** · **METHOD ONE:**

How to Do a Dual Boot Installation with Windows 7 and XP

Information

This will show you how to install Windows 7 and XP to dual boot with when you already have either Windows 7 or XP installed first.

Note

With a dual boot installaton, you will have two operating systems (OS) installed. When you start the computer, you will have the choice to choose which OS you would like to start up to. This method is the easiest way of doing a dual boot with these two operating systems.

Tip

When dual booting with another OS (ex: Vista or XP), you may not always have that OS partition show up in Computer with a driver letter in Windows 7. If this happens, then you will just need to add a drive letter to the OS (ex: Vista or XP) partition in Windows 7 Disk Management for it to show up in Computer with a driver letter.

Warning

To stop XP from deleting your Windows 7 System Restore Points everytime XP is started, then see System Restore Points - Stop XP Dual Boot Delete to hide Windows 7 from XP.

Windows 7 Minimum Hardware Requirements:
NOTE: For more information on this, see: Windows 7 system requirements

1 GHz 32-bit or 64-bit processor
1 GB RAM for 32-bit Windows 7 OR 2 GB RAM for 64-bit Windows 7
16 GB available disk space 32-bit Windows 7 OR 20 GB for 64-bit Windows 7
Support for DirectX 9 graphics with 128 MB memory (in order to enable Aero theme)
DVD-R/W Drive
Internet or phone access to activate Windows 7.

Windows XP Minimum Hardware Requirements:
NOTE: For more information on this, see: System requirements for Windows XP operating systems

PC with 300 megahertz (MHz) or higher processor clock speed recommended; 233-MHz minimum required;* Intel Pentium/Celeron family, AMD K6/Athlon/Duron family, or compatible processor recommended
128 megabytes (MB) of RAM or higher recommended (64 MB minimum supported; may limit performance and some features)
1.5 gigabyte (GB) of available hard disk space.*
Super VGA (800 × 600) or higher resolution video adapter and monitor
CD-ROM or DVD drive
Keyboard and Microsoft Mouse or compatible pointing device

RELATED LINKS:

EXAMPLE: Windows Boot Manager
NOTE: This is the boot screen where you select what operating system that you would like to start. By default, you have 30 seconds to choose another operating system before the default operating system will start automatically.

METHOD ONE:
When XP is Installed First

1. To Create a New Partition from the XP Hard Disk Drive -
A) With your Windows 7 installation disc boot into the Command Prompt from the System Recovery Options screen.
NOTE: Make sure that the CD/DVD drive is selected first in the boot order in the BIOS.

B) In the command prompt, select and shrink the XP volume by how many MB (1024 MB = 1 GB) you want to have for this Windows 7 partition. (See screenshot below)
NOTE: You would do steps 2 to 9 in METHOD TWO at that link. Windows 7 will need a minimum of 16 GB (16384 MB).

C) Click on the X at the top right corner to close the command prompt. (See screenshot above)

D) Click on the X at the top right corner to close System Recovery Options. (See screenshot below)

E) Go to step 3.

2. To Use a Separate Hard Disk Drive than the XP Drive -
A) Boot from your Windows 7 installation disc.
NOTE: Make sure that the CD/DVD drive is selected first in the boot order in the BIOS.

3. Click on the Install now button. (See screenshot below)

4. When you get to this point, select the partition (step 1) or hard drive to install Windows 7 on. (See screenshot below)

5. Finish installing Windows 7.
NOTE: You would do step 9 on at that link to finish installing Windows 7.

6. When finished, restart the computer to have the option to boot from XP (Earlier Verision of Windows) or Windows 7. (See screenshot below)

METHOD TWO:
When Windows 7 is Installed First

1. To Create a New Partition from the Windows 7 Hard Disk Drive -
NOTE: If you want to install XP on a separate hard drive instead, then skip this step and go to step 2.
A) In Windows 7, select and shrink the Windows 7 volume in Disk Management by how many MB (1024 MB = 1 GB) you want to have for this XP partition. (See screenshots below)
NOTE: You would do all of Method One at that link.

2. Insert your XP installation disc, then restart the computer and press any key to boot from it when prompted. (See screenshot below)
NOTE: Make sure that the CD/DVD drive is selected first in the boot order in the BIOS.

3. From XP Setup, Press Enter. (See screenshot below)

4. Press F8. (See screenshot below)
NOTE: On some multimedia keyboards, you may need to press the F-Lock or Function key before pressing F8.

5. Select the partition (step 1) or hard drive that you want to install XP on using the arrow keys and press Enter.

6. Finish installing XP.

7. In XP, download and install .Net Framework 2.0 and EasyBCD.
NOTE: In XP, Net Framework is required to be installed to run the free program EasyBCD.

8. Run EasyBCD.
NOTE: This is required to repair the Windows 7 boot file and add XP to the Windows Boot Manager list.

9. In EasyBCD, click on Add/Remove Entries (left side). (See screenshot below)

10. In the bottom right section under Add and Entry, type Microsoft Windows XP (name displayed in Windows Boot Manager) for the Name.
NOTE: You can type whatever name you would like to have displayed in the Windows Boot Manager for XP though.

A) If you have a 100mb System Reserved partition with Windows 7, then right click it in Disk Management and give it a drive letter ( S is a good choice). Then select the letter you assigned (ex: S ) in the EasyBCD Drive drop down menu.

OR

B) If you don't have a 100mb System Reserved partition with Windows 7, then select the drive letter (ex: C: ) that Windows 7 is installed on from the Drive drop down menu in EasyBCD.

11. To the right of Type, select Windows NT/2k/XP/2k3 from the drop down menu.

12. Click on the Add Entry button. (See screenshot above)

13. You will now notice that this has added Microsoft Windows XP to the upper right section. Click on the Save button. (See screenshot below)

14. In EasyBCD, click on Manage Bootloader (left side). (See screenshot below)

15. In the upper right section under Bootloader Installer Options, select (dot) Reinstall the Vista Bootloader, then click on the Write MBR button. (See screenshot above)

16. Close EasyBCD.

17. Restart the computer to have the option to boot from XP or Windows 7. (See screenshot below)

That's it,
Shawn

.

**Nikolay** · 04-28-2009

Great guide. Just wish this was made sooner, the one that I used wasn't as clear as yours.

**Brink** · 04-28-2009

You're welcome Nikolay, and thank you.

Yeah, I wish I had it sooner also, but I just now manged to get my hands on a copy of XP to work with.

stinkstink · 05-03-2009

i am currently running windows 7 as the main OS and want to install XP as a dual boot. i've followed all the steps above but after loading the win xp files and trying to boot into xp i get a msg that says "error loading operating system" . any ideas?

**Brink** · 05-03-2009

Hello Stinkstink, and welcome to Seven Forums.

You may have a bad installation of XP. You might see if reinstalling using METHOD TWO may allow it to work afterwards.

Kingism · 05-04-2009

Good Morning everyone, I have installed Win 7 first on my laptop and I installed xp secondly. I rebooted and it only boots to xp. I noticed that Win 7 is on C and XP is on E drive . But when I was on Win 7 ,XP was on drive D . I followed the above tutorial and downloaded BCD and followed it and only got to boot to Win 7 . No options were given to choose an OS at boot up. Im now in XP and cant get back to Win 7. I went ahead and put in my Windows 7 disk and it repaired itself but when I did the tutorial it booted back to XP . Any help will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks ..

**Brink** · 05-04-2009

Hello Kingism,

I have updated the tutorial to help with this. In METHOD TWO step 10, check to make sure that you select the drive letter that Windows 7 was installed on. Normally this would be C:

Hope this helps,
Shawn

stinkstink · 05-06-2009

i reinstalled windows xp again and followed all the steps above. but now when i choose to boot into win xp from the boot manager i get this error message
"Windows could not start because the following file is missing or corrupt.

<Root>\system32\ntoskrnl.exe

Please reinstall a copy of the above file."

i have reinstalled this file from the winxp cd but still no fix. any ideas?

**Brink** · 05-06-2009

Stinkstink,

Since you can only boot into Windows 7, do steps 8 on in METHOD TWO to add XP back to the boot file. It sounds like you may have missed step 12 & 13 before.

Luciak · 05-07-2009

Here's a riddle (at least for me):

I've installed Windows 7 to be the second system with Windows XP using baarod's method with a little modification using tips from this tutorial.

What I've done is described in this baarod's tutorial.

And the riddle:

Everything is working properly but here is what I see when I am on XP:

And here is what I see when I am on Windows 7:

Why is it like this?