Dual boot / Dual Drive queries

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  1. Posts : 24
    Windows 7 Home Premum 32bit
    Thread Starter
       #11

    Thanks all for the information, for me it's nice to be able to head into uncharted territory with knowledge of what lies ahead. I've had a read through those links and found them very helpful, and I tend to agree, I don't think theres any reason to avoid the "system reserved" partition.

    As it stands it looks like I will run the installation disc with only the SSD connected, that way keeping the Windows installations separate and ensuring the "system reserved" partition doesn't wander off onto another drive! I'm going to run through this procedure tomorrow, so it's goodnight for now but I'll report back on my progress :)
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  2. Posts : 22,814
    W 7 64-bit Ultimate
       #12

    Be sure to post back here to keep us informed.
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  3. Posts : 11,408
    ME/XP/Vista/Win7
       #13

    Bare Foot Kid said:
    Hello qwikpix, welcome to Seven Forums!


    The BIOS hot-key to trigger the ASUS one-time boot menu is the F8 key at PC startup.

    Both Vista and Windows 7 will use the C: drive letter while booted to each respectively and "the other" OS will have the next available drive letter in the booted OS.

    The other partitions will have different drive letters between the 2 OS but you can reassign the letters as long as that won't break any installed prog/app associations by doing so.
    Dual boot / Dual Drive queries-ga-bios2.png

    First check for all the Win XP drivers for your hardware on the manufacturer's web site.
    If your Win XP CD, does not support your Sata Controller, you will need to load drivers to uses at F6.
    Load Sata Controller drivers with a floppy disk is the best way.
    SATA Drivers - Load in Windows XP Setup on Dual Boot
    OR
    SATA Drivers - Slipstream into Windows XP CD



    Dual Boot Installation with Windows 7 and XP

    System Restore Points - Stop XP Dual Boot Delete - Vista Forums
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  4. Posts : 24
    Windows 7 Home Premum 32bit
    Thread Starter
       #14

    Hey guys

    Been a busy weekend but managed to squeeze in some time to set up my SSD w/ Windows7. Installation went down without any apparent problems - I've loaded chipset, sata, gpu and other basic drivers and all seems well. Haven't had much time to test it out but it definitely felt much snappier all round.

    I'm going to have to do some reading and tinkering over the coming days, making sure I've get the OS and any programs optimsed for SSD usage. I was a little surprised to see the Windows 7 install come in at just over 21Gb. I can't remember what it exactly it was when I installed Vista but I seem to remember it being closer to 12-13GB. I suppose it has the impression of being much larger with a 120Gb SSD over my 500Gb Vista boot drive which makes that look pretty insignificant. From a bit of a search it looks like I might be able to reduce this size by some tweaks and reductions of page file sizes and such.

    Also, drive letters are, as you all assured me, no issue!

    Got to thank you all for your help for making the whole process speedy and problem free ;D
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  5.    #15

    qwikpix said:
    - I've loaded chipset, sata, gpu and other basic drivers and all seems well.
    Were these drivers missing after install and optional Updates?

    This is not XP. There is no need to change out drivers given by the Win7 installer and then quickly updated by optional Windows Updates unless there are performance problems confirmed to be caused by those drivers.
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  6.   My Computer


  7. Posts : 24
    Windows 7 Home Premum 32bit
    Thread Starter
       #17

    @theog, thanks for those links, I'll definately give those a read :) In relation to the sector alignment, I've come across that mentioned in relation to SSDs before but from what it shows Windows 7 will hopefully handle the necessaries for SSDs? One thing that comes to mind is that with the newer 25nm SSDs the page file has gone from 4 to 8 but I don't think this will pose any problems?!?

    @gregrocker, they weren't there after install - for example the AHCI drivers were only the standard Windows one rather than the Intel one which meant my SSD and optical drive were showing up in the "safely remove hardware" icon, installing the latest Matrix Storage Manager sorted it out though. Tbh the method you described using the windows update slipped my mind and I went into autopilot mode and dled the latest drivers from the respective sites, probably because the manual process is something I've become accustomed to on previous installs! I'm right with you when it comes to startup programs, I've always been careful to avoid unnecessary applications crawling into startup One thing I was wondering about was what you mentioned about Puran boot-time defragger, is this an SSD consolidation tool, since defragging appears to be sort of obsolete on SSDs?
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  8.    #18

    I would never defrag an SSD based on warnings read here.

    Win7 is the authority on its own drivers. MS spent a fortune getting the drivers into the installer or quickly updated via Optional Updates, even paying manufacturers to build them under WHQL so they wouldn't holdout to force us to buy newer hardware as they did in Vista. So MS has them first in the installer and Updates.

    Your SSD appears in Safely Remove Hardware because AHCI driver and BIOS setting enable hotplugging, and this is how many mobos allow safe hotplugging/unplugging.

    There are new methods and tools with Win7 and this is the place to learn them since we've been sorting them out for several years now.
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  9. Posts : 24
    Windows 7 Home Premum 32bit
    Thread Starter
       #19

    gregrocker said:
    This is not XP. There is no need to change out drivers given by the Win7 installer and then quickly updated by optional Windows Updates unless there are performance problems confirmed to be caused by those drivers.
    Hey, didn't see the second comment (I assumed you edited it in) What is the Windows Update tool like for GPU drivers?
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  10. Posts : 24
    Windows 7 Home Premum 32bit
    Thread Starter
       #20

    gregrocker said:
    I would never defrag an SSD based on warnings read here.

    Win7 is the authority on its own drivers. MS spent a fortune getting the drivers into the installer or quickly updated via Optional Updates, even paying manufacturers to build them under WHQL so they wouldn't holdout to force us to buy newer hardware as they did in Vista. So MS has them first in the installer and Updates. You may have imported older or inferior drivers although the maker's SATA controller was likely a good solution.

    There are new methods and tools with Win7 and this is the place to learn them since we've been sorting them out for several years now.
    Yeah, it makes sense to really be stringent about up-to-date drivers when releasing a new OS. In my defence I went after the SATA drivers after noticing the strange appearance of my SSD in the remove hardware notification! I assume the Windows update process will retrospectively identify any older drivers I've installed and update them if necessary? Apart from the drivers I mentioned I only installed drivers for my soundcard and W7 sorted stuff out for my scanner and printer

    I will say I have had an interesting experience trying to get some older hardware to run on Windows 7 on our office setup - In one case Vista drivers came to the rescue and in the other a 3rd party solution so despite their efforts I don't think the manual drive installation process is entirely behind us yet.
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