Dual boot XP and ME

  • Thread starter Thread starter Brian
  • Start date Start date
B

Brian

I recently added a smaller second HDD (6GB) to my Win XP
system, and installed a fresh version of Win ME on it (in
order to play a particular computer game). How do I edit
the boot.ini file in order to be able to pick between ME
and XP during bootup? I have tried adding the following
line to the boot.ini file:

multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Windows ME"
/fastdetect

and the computer goes to the second HDD (D:\), but does not
boot. I keep getting error messages indicating that it is
looking for files in the windows\system32 folder.

Any suggestions??

Brian
 
To dual boot you need Windows ME on your C: drive. It is
important that the oldest operating system is 'always'
installed first, followed by the latest operating system.
In some cases it can be done the other way around, but it
requires extensive editing of the registry and is not
therefore recommended. It is also easier to dual boot
from a single drive with two partitions rather than two
seperate hard drives.

Hope this helps

John Barnett - MVP
Associate expert
 
John,

Well, that is indeed bad news, since I had XP installed
first. I only installed ME on the second HDD so I could
continue to run Morrowind, which doesn't seem to want to
run under XP with my particular hardware configuration. XP
is on my C-drive and ME is on my D-drive. Since it's way
way too much trouble reinstalled both OS's, I guess I'll
have to continue with my current method of changing the
boot disk from the CMOS.

How about 3rd-party boot managers? Would those do what I want?

Brian
 
Brian said:
Well, that is indeed bad news, since I had XP installed
first. I only installed ME on the second HDD so I could
continue to run Morrowind, which doesn't seem to want to
run under XP with my particular hardware configuration. XP
is on my C-drive and ME is on my D-drive. Since it's way
way too much trouble reinstalled both OS's, I guess I'll
have to continue with my current method of changing the
boot disk from the CMOS.

How about 3rd-party boot managers? Would those do what I want?
Click to expand...

Brian, John makes it sound more dismal than it is. You do not always
have to install the oldest OS first, that's just the way MS would prefer
you do it. But first, you need to understand that the MS way of
dualbooting is different and incompatible with third-party boot
managers. The MS way intertwines the OS's (hence, the recommendation to
install oldest first, so the intertwining gets set up right) and uses
boot.ini to define the available OS's in the boot menu. The third-party
way does not intertwine OS's and uses a separate boot manager, not the
boot.ini file. You're trying to mix the methods by installing ME
without intertwining and looking to dualboot through boot.ini.

To use the MS way and control dualbooting through boot.ini, see Doug
Knox's WinXP tips (www.dougknox.com) on installing 98/ME after XP. But
that would require you to reinstall your ME to get them intertwined. If
you want to control your dualbooting with boot.ini and are willing to
reinstall ME, you can follow Doug's procedure. NOTE: Doug's procedure
does not work if your XP partition is NTFS.

The way you installed ME was as a standalone OS, not intertwined with
XP. Thus, boot.ini cannpt control your dualbooting and you would need
to use a third-party boot manager. This can be done with a wide variety
of third-party boot managers, including XOSL and GAG (both freeware),
BootIt NG (shareware), BootMagic (bundled with PartitionMagic), and
System Commander (commercial payware), to name some of the more popular.
If you don't already have partitioning software (ala, PartitionMagic) or
imaging/cloning software (Ghost or DriveImage), then I would highly
recommend BootIt NG, a partitioning/imaging/boot-mgr all-in-one that is
a genuine bargain for its $35 shareware price and 30-day free trial.

BTW, you'll confuse people by improperly referring to your hard disks as
C-drive and D-drive. Drive letters are assigned by the OS and are
undefined until you boot into an OS. You're second HDD may look to XP
like D:, but I'll bet ME sees it as C:. The only way I could tell for
sure what you meant was your reference to "changing the boot disk from
the CMOS" -- that told me you had to have installed ME as a standalone.
 
-----Original Message-----

I want?

Brian, John makes it sound more dismal than it is. You do not always
have to install the oldest OS first, that's just the way MS would prefer
you do it. But first, you need to understand that the MS way of
dualbooting is different and incompatible with third-party boot
managers. The MS way intertwines the OS's (hence, the recommendation to
install oldest first, so the intertwining gets set up right) and uses
boot.ini to define the available OS's in the boot menu. The third-party
way does not intertwine OS's and uses a separate boot manager, not the
boot.ini file. You're trying to mix the methods by installing ME
without intertwining and looking to dualboot through boot.ini.

To use the MS way and control dualbooting through boot.ini, see Doug
Knox's WinXP tips (www.dougknox.com) on installing 98/ME after XP. But
that would require you to reinstall your ME to get them intertwined. If
you want to control your dualbooting with boot.ini and are willing to
reinstall ME, you can follow Doug's procedure. NOTE: Doug's procedure
does not work if your XP partition is NTFS.

The way you installed ME was as a standalone OS, not intertwined with
XP. Thus, boot.ini cannpt control your dualbooting and you would need
to use a third-party boot manager. This can be done with a wide variety
of third-party boot managers, including XOSL and GAG (both freeware),
BootIt NG (shareware), BootMagic (bundled with PartitionMagic), and
System Commander (commercial payware), to name some of the more popular.
If you don't already have partitioning software (ala, PartitionMagic) or
imaging/cloning software (Ghost or DriveImage), then I would highly
recommend BootIt NG, a partitioning/imaging/boot-mgr all-in-one that is
a genuine bargain for its $35 shareware price and 30-day free trial.

BTW, you'll confuse people by improperly referring to your hard disks as
C-drive and D-drive. Drive letters are assigned by the OS and are
undefined until you boot into an OS. You're second HDD may look to XP
like D:, but I'll bet ME sees it as C:. The only way I could tell for
sure what you meant was your reference to "changing the boot disk from
the CMOS" -- that told me you had to have installed ME as a standalone.



.
Click to expand...
Dan,

Thanks for the reply. I did try a few 3rd-party boot
managers (i.e., MR boot 3.2, and OSL2000) and they worked
OK, except that both would hide the XP partition on HDD0 if
I booted from the Win ME partition on HDD1. Both programs
indicated that if Win 98/ME was installed on a second HDD,
and XP was on the first, then HDD0 "had" to be hidden, and
there was no workaround. Normally this would be OK, except
that when running Win ME (from HDD1), I am accessing
Morrowind from HDD0, so I need to be able to see both
drives. This is because HDD1 is an older, much slower,
drive, and the game runs too slowly on this drive. If I
change the CMOS to boot from HDD1, I can see both drives
under ME.

Do you know if any of the other disk managers you mentioned
do not have this problem? Otherwise, I may try Knox's
method and reinstall ME, or I will have to stay with the
CMOS method.

Brian
 
Brian said:
Thanks for the reply. I did try a few 3rd-party boot
managers (i.e., MR boot 3.2, and OSL2000) and they worked
OK, except that both would hide the XP partition on HDD0 if
I booted from the Win ME partition on HDD1. Both programs
indicated that if Win 98/ME was installed on a second HDD,
and XP was on the first, then HDD0 "had" to be hidden, and
there was no workaround. Normally this would be OK, except
that when running Win ME (from HDD1), I am accessing
Morrowind from HDD0, so I need to be able to see both
drives. This is because HDD1 is an older, much slower,
drive, and the game runs too slowly on this drive. If I
change the CMOS to boot from HDD1, I can see both drives
under ME.

Do you know if any of the other disk managers you mentioned
do not have this problem? Otherwise, I may try Knox's
method and reinstall ME, or I will have to stay with the
CMOS method.
Click to expand...

I rarely use multiple HDDs, so don't know the details of how each boot
manager handles booting from the second HDD. The problem is, I believe,
mainly with Win95/98/ME, which would designate any primary partition on
an "earlier" HDD as C:, which fouls up the boot process. That's why
they say the partitions on the earlier HDD (HDD0) must be hidden.
BootMagic is also a simplistic manager and takes this approach -- you
cannot boot from HDD1 unless all partitions on HDD0 are hidden.

Your CMOS swap procedure gets around the problem because the second disk
becomes HDD0. XOSL and BootIt NG claim they can swap the disks
dynamically, which may achieve the same result as your CMOS swapping
(i.e., HDD0 becomes HDD1, and vice versa). Not having explored that
feature, I can't say how well it works. I've heard GAG and System
Commander also claim that feature. You may want to visit the BootIt
newsgroup (see www.terabyteunlimited.com) and leave a msg -- tech
support is responsive and very good. Ask specifically if you can boot
from a second HDD and have a primary partition on the first HDD visible
at the same time.

If you decide to try Doug Knox's technique, remember that it won't work
if XP is in a NTFS partition, and bear in mind that when ME boots it
will see itself as D: and the XP partition will be C:. I assume your XP
is FAT32 (you said you're accessing Morrowind from it when booted to
ME), but consider whether the redefined drive letters will be a problem
for Morrowind. If the drive letters aren't a problem, I think Doug's
technique might be the easiest way to go.
 
-----Original Message-----



I rarely use multiple HDDs, so don't know the details of how each boot
manager handles booting from the second HDD. The problem is, I believe,
mainly with Win95/98/ME, which would designate any primary partition on
an "earlier" HDD as C:, which fouls up the boot process. That's why
they say the partitions on the earlier HDD (HDD0) must be hidden.
BootMagic is also a simplistic manager and takes this approach -- you
cannot boot from HDD1 unless all partitions on HDD0 are hidden.

Your CMOS swap procedure gets around the problem because the second disk
becomes HDD0. XOSL and BootIt NG claim they can swap the disks
dynamically, which may achieve the same result as your CMOS swapping
(i.e., HDD0 becomes HDD1, and vice versa). Not having explored that
feature, I can't say how well it works. I've heard GAG and System
Commander also claim that feature. You may want to visit the BootIt
newsgroup (see www.terabyteunlimited.com) and leave a msg -- tech
support is responsive and very good. Ask specifically if you can boot
from a second HDD and have a primary partition on the first HDD visible
at the same time.

If you decide to try Doug Knox's technique, remember that it won't work
if XP is in a NTFS partition, and bear in mind that when ME boots it
will see itself as D: and the XP partition will be C:. I assume your XP
is FAT32 (you said you're accessing Morrowind from it when booted to
ME), but consider whether the redefined drive letters will be a problem
for Morrowind. If the drive letters aren't a problem, I think Doug's
technique might be the easiest way to go.



.
Click to expand...
I will look at the other boot managers you suggest. FYI,
both OS partitions are FAT32. I have Morrowind installed
on both partitions, and the saved games are swapable, so
whether its C: or D: is no problem.

Brian
 
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