Questions before creating XP Dual Boot from Windows 7

Hello,

Thanks for any help you can provide. I just bought a new HP laptop with Windows 7 on it and I want to create a dual boot with XP so I can still run ProToolsLE 7.0 for music recording. I read the great tutorial here: Dual Boot Installation with Windows 7 and XP and I just wanted to get a few things straight before I try to do this (never done this before). Processor is I3-330 and hard drive is 500 GB 7200 RPM SATA drive.

1a. (Do I need to do anything different from Tutorial with a SATA hard drive?)

1. Currently there are 3 drives: C: Local Disk, D: Recovery, E: HP_Tools. I don't want to delete any of these drives; Can I still create a new drive or should I delete everything on the D: drive? Is there a proper way to cleanse the D: drive if I have to do this?

2. How much space should I allocate for Windows XP drive? I think 130GB should be enough for recording songs, will that work?

3. The disc I want to use is a Windows XP Professional SP2. Will this work?

4. Most importantly - once I get started partitioning the drive to set it up for a dual boot, can I reverse everything I did to get it back to normal in case I am unable to successfully create the dual boot?

5. Once I boot into Windows XP, can I use it to make a floppy disc boot disc to try one last time to successfully fix my old laptop, as I think the CD-ROM is broken it and CD Boot discs did not work for it. Also if anyone wants to share how I can make a floppy boot disc for XP that would be great. I'd have to go buy an external floppy drive with USB.

Thanks for any help!

1a. (Do I need to do anything different from Tutorial with a SATA hard drive?) If XP won't detect HD, you may have to insert drivers at F6 prompt during driver loading using floppy drive, or if no floppy (XP is ancient) then slipstream in drivers: http://www.digitgeek.com/how-to-slip...rs-into-xp-cd/

1. Currently there are 3 drives: C: Local Disk, D: Recovery, E: HP_Tools. I don't want to delete any of these drives; Can I still create a new drive or should I delete everything on the D: drive? Is there a proper way to cleanse the D: drive if I have to do this? Recov may still work as long as Win7 is not clean reinstalled so I would save it, but make your Recov disks just to be sure. Follow the tutorial's steps to shrink Win7 partition unless this isn't enough space and you need help recovering the other utility partitions but I'd do that after install.

2. How much space should I allocate for Windows XP drive? I think 130GB should be enough for recording songs, will that work? That is your call based on your usage needs.

3. The disc I want to use is a Windows XP Professional SP2. Will this work? Yes, standard XP install disk. You'll need to do a lot of updating after install leading up to and including SP3.

4. Most importantly - once I get started partitioning the drive to set it up for a dual boot, can I reverse everything I did to get it back to normal in case I am unable to successfully create the dual boot? Yes, another reason to shrink Win7 and not bother the Recov partition unless needed.

5. Once I boot into Windows XP, can I use it to make a floppy disc boot disc to try one last time to successfully fix my old laptop, as I think the CD-ROM is broken it and CD Boot discs did not work for it. Also if anyone wants to share how I can make a floppy boot disc for XP that would be great. I'd have to go buy an external floppy drive with USB. What is the error message on old laptop XP install attempt? Floppy installer can be made from web tutorials.

Thanks. I just made my Recovery DVDs last night. 1a looks complicated for a novice like myself but I'll see what I can do.

Another question - should I choose the option for "Compress This Drive to Save Disc Space" on the C: drive before beginning this whole process?

As for the error message on my old laptop - there isn't one, but even using an XP Disc and a BartPE disc and BIOS set to boot from CD-Rom first, my old laptop will not do anything with the CDs I was putting in it. It just goes straight to the log-in screen, but I can't login b/c I downloaded a loop virus I guess so it immediately logs me off. I know to fix it, I have to go change a registry key value, the problem is I cannot access the registry because even with BartPE it does not read the disc. So my last hope was to try if it could boot from a floppy so i could change the registry value I needed to. But that might not work b/c even if I get an external floppy drive, if I can't log in to the old computer, I'm not sure I'd even able to use it.

Have you set the CD drive in old laptop to boot first in BIOS setup, before HD?

Do you need to try to rescue files, or are you ready to wipe the HD? If so, try running DBAN CD or free Partition Wizard CD which will both autostart without boot prompt to deep clean or zero the HD.

PW will even allow you to browse your files, shrink the existing partition to install a parallel XP to access your files.

You can run Avast boot scan and Spybot in Safe Mode upon new XP startup to check for and clean infection.

Yeah, I changed the Bios to boot CD first. It still won't boot a CD. I think my CD-ROM hardware is just jacked. I'd like to keep the files, but I'm alright with wiping it clean if I have to.

Also - should I compress the C: drive before I try doing the partition to set up dual boot on my new computer?

If you need the space, sure, you can check the box on drive Properties.

gregrocker said:

1a. (Do I need to do anything different from Tutorial with a SATA hard drive?) If XP won't detect HD, you may have to insert drivers at F6 prompt during driver loading using floppy drive, or if no floppy (XP is ancient) then slipstream in drivers: How To Slipstream SATA Drivers Into XP CD

Do I need to "slipstream" the Sata drivers on an XP machine and I can follow that digitgeek guide using Windows 7? Sorry if this is a dumb machine.

Your ProTools won`t work on W7 ??

Why not try installing XP in a Virtual Machine first?

Jimmy Timmy said:

gregrocker said:

1a. (Do I need to do anything different from Tutorial with a SATA hard drive?) If XP won't detect HD, you may have to insert drivers at F6 prompt during driver loading using floppy drive, or if no floppy (XP is ancient) then slipstream in drivers: How To Slipstream SATA Drivers Into XP CD

Do I need to "slipstream" the Sata drivers on an XP machine and I can follow that digitgeek guide using Windows 7? Sorry if this is a dumb machine.

Take a look here:

SATA Drivers - Load in Windows XP Setup on Dual Boot

Do you have the 100mb System Reserved partition? If so, that takes up one primary partition and you can only have 4, or 3 primary and an extended. If you do already have 4 partitions, it might cause problems.

XP will install normally with just SATA drives set to IDE. If you have them set to AHCI you will need to load the drivers, and I used a USB floppy.

If you have the System Reserved partition, it can cause problems for the XP install, so make sure. If you do not know, check disk management to see if it shows.