How would I dual-boot in this scenario?

We have Macrium experts here if needed.

I'm almost sure it has the same features of Acronis - again, that premium software is free if you have any WD or Seagate HD's involved . You should be able to save an image to a file as you're doing, then point it to reimage an unallocated space of the same or larger size on the same HD.

Normally then all you'd need to do is add it with EasyBCD and it will start up from a Dual Boot menu.

But XP is so old now it cannot be expected to start on modern hardware without first supplying the SATA controller.

The only thing I think I would have done differently is save the image to external as I'd suggested.

Disk image - complete and stored in the C partition.

Used Macrium Reflect to set up Windows PE Rescue Media and booted from it. This was necessary because the image could not be restored onto a hard drive from which the current OS was running.

Working with Reflect in the rescue environment, I prepared to reimage. I was given a warning showing that the C-drive, my main and W7 one as mentioned, would be wiped in the process.

I will begin the process anew, this time sending the image to the external HD. If I get the same warning, well, I won't know what to do...

Stand by for a Macrium expert's help.

At the present time, the disk image is on the external drive.

I would like to reimage it to a new partition on my Windows 7 hard drive, so that I may dual boot.

I am not permitted by Macrium to restore the image onto a hard drive on which the presently running oS is. To get around this, I created WindowsPE rescue media with Macrium Reflect on it.

Loading it upon boot, I attempt to reimage. However, on both occasions, whether the image is in the C partition of my internal hard drive or on the external hard drive, Macrium Reflect warns me that proceeding with the image restoration would erase the C ("OS") and F ("System") drives.

As I do not wish to erase my main and Windows 7 partition on my machine...

Have you prepared Unallocated Space on the HD large enough for the image to be applied to?

Read the Macrium Manual for how to apply image to this space, until Wolfgang comes back to guide you.

I've asked you if you have any WD or Seagate HD's as the Acronis free app could do all of this from C without even having to reboot until you've imaged, added with EasyBCD, then adjusted with Paragon app if necessary to start it on new hardware.

I've asked you if you have any WD or Seagate HD's as the Acronis free app could do all of this from C without even having to reboot until you've imaged

I mentioned that I do not own this complimentary software. To be specific, all three of the drives (old, external, and internal W7) are Toshiba/Samsung.


Here are some screencaps:

It doesn't appear you have deleted the target partition to make Unallocated Space, which may be why it's not able to prompt you where the image goes and wants to overwrite C.

You also do not want to transfer the XP MBR which should remain the Win7 MBR on the System Reserved partition, nor do you want to mark the XP partition Active or it will deactivate the Win7 System Reserved partition which needs to remain System Active to boot both OS's.

Once XP is imaged onto Unallocated Space of its same size or larger, boot into Win7 to add XP using EasyBCD. Then if it won't boot use Paragon app to adjust it providing XP SATA driver if prompted.