dualboot windows Vista on my system

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Guest

O.k. I will keep this as short and sweat as I can.

What I have,

Asus A8V Deluxe motherboard,
ATI Radion x1600 512mb AGP Graphics card
AMD 4400x2 dual core cpu,
4 gigs of ram (4x1024)
1: 74 gig wd raptor sata on via header #1
1: 200 gig wd cavier sata on via header #2
1: 200 gig wd cavier sata on promise raid header #1 (1st raid aray 1+0 stripe)
1: 200 gig wd cavier sata on promise raid header #2 (2nd raid aray 1+0 stripe)
windows xp pro x64(64 bit version) is installed on the raptor 74 gig, all
other drives are for game, movie, pics., and music storage.
The two 1+0 stripe arays, basicly are just two seperate drives

What I want to do,

Install 1: 80 gig wd cavier ide on the via raid ide header, (the only hdd
header left on my mother board) and build a 3rd raid aray 1+0 strip
Install windows Vista Home Premium,(64 bit version)
on the 80 gig wd cavier ide drive.(3rd raid aray 1+0)

I sure my system is good to go to run vista, but my question is can I
install it on my existing system without removing anything, and will it dual
boot with the existing o.s.?

My main concern is that vista will be on an ide drive, and xp pro x64 will
be on a sata drive. I have never tried to dual boot between an ide, and sata
hdd.

Does anyone know if this can be done?

Thanks, and have a outstanding day,
Robert
 
Hi Robert,

I have an A8V mainboard and dual booted Vista and XP on sata and ide drives.
The short answer is yes you can do it but be wary of problems :)

It doesn't matter which operating system you install first. When you
install the second operating system it will load the boot sector onto the
first hard drive. I messed with the setup options for a while trying to get
it right and the only way I could get it to work was to physically unplug the
disc drives while I was installing. So basically if you unplug all of the
disc drives except the one you wish to install Vista on, format, set up the
raid, install Vista, then plug back in the drives. This way there is
absolutely no way to install any files onto the wrong drive. When you boot
simply press F11 and choose which operating system you wish to start.

Hope this helps.
 
O.K. How about if I just use norton partition magic, and partition the first
hard drive (74 gig wd raptor) in half leaveing window xp pro x64 on the first
partition, and install vista on the second partition?
Should have no problems at all then, right?
 
Hi Rob,

I'm not saying it is impossible to do, all I'm saying is that would not be
my preferred way to do it. When I had XP installed and then installed Vista
in dual boot, the installer kept installing the Vista Boot sector onto the XP
drive. What this meant was when booted i chose which operating system to
load through Windows rather than choose through the BIOS.

What this would mean for you is if you have to format the partition with XP
on it (for whatever reason) you then wouldn't be able to boot into Vista
either. Or conversely if you format the partition with Vista on it you would
still leave the boot files of Vista on your XP drive(not difficult to delete
but still annoying). The only way I can personally guarantee a perfect
install for both OS's is to physically unplug the other hard drives while
installing.

So there is no problem to dual boot of two partitions on the same drive as
you intend, the only problem would be when you go to remove them. I am not a
tech just speaking from my experience, maybe someone else is able to give you
advice on how to force the installer to install the boot files on the
partition of your choice and everything will be peachy.

P.S. I my previous post i said press F11 at boot but I actually meant
press F8 before the computer finishes P.O.S.T. to choose boot drive.


Best Regards,
Mr Slartybartfast
 
i just saw another thread on this page titled "Vista Multiboot issues, Part
II" about five threads which you might want to read. Shows a similar
complication to what I am warning of.
 
I know what ya ment with the f8(f11) key to boot two or more os's. I guess I
will try to keep this install simple. I realy have no need for a 5th hard
drive, I have plenty of space on this p.c. I have dual booted before with
2000 pro, and xp. So let me just make sure I understand the dualboot advice
you gave me. I am under the understanding, that vista will put the bootloader
and whatever files it needs on the first drive on the system, in my case
thats is the sata wd raptor. If I partition that raptor drive, and keep the
existing os on it, and then install vista on the other partition on the wd
raptor, will it give me the option to chose witch os I want to boot
automaticly, like the other dual boot system I have? That is without having
to use the f8 key. Also if I do this will I still have to unplug the othe
sata drives to avoid an files to be installed on any other drives when
installing vista? Or will vista automaticly put whatever it needs on the
first sata drive on the system? Meaning C drive. It would be sweet if I could
just partition the drive, and install vista, and I would get a windows boot
option at startup without having files on other hard drives, and without even
taking my pc out of it's hole in my computer desk.

Thanks for all the help,
Robert
 
--

In a nutshell, YES. re-partition the raptor with the original OS, then
install Vista on the same raptor and you will have exactly what you want.
You wont need to unplug the other drives. You won't need to press F8 at
boot. All of the boot files will be on the first partition with the original
OS.

Sorry to make it more confusing than you needed but I was under the
impression you would prefer to press f8 at startup like I would. It is only
an advantage if you reformat your drives later-on.
 
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