Installed W7, problems dual-booting with XP

[Anchundan]

I've just got back home from UK, where I picked up a full retail version of Windows 7 Professional, and a new 1TB HDD.

I currently have a 500GB drive which I used to have multiple boots with W7 RC2, XP (English) and XP (Chinese). It all worked very well. But since this new drive is faster, I just want to partition the new drive and use the old drive for backup.

So I created Partition no.1 with 65GB, Partition no.2 with 20GB, Partition no.3 with 15GB and Partition no.4 with the rest, to contain all my data/work/photos/etc.

I installed W7 Professional with no problems. Then installed all my applications, copied my data across, and got everything the way I wanted.

This morning I decided I would install XP on the 20GB partition. I rebooted with the XP disc in the PC. It started to install ok, up to the first reboot, when it wouldn't reboot. It also wouldn't reboot back into Windows 7. The repair disk did nothing, except to tell me that it couldn't find a fault. So I've spent the whole of today swapping my old disks around, trying to boot back into W7 RC2, and playing around with the boot editor.

I've finally got W7 professional back up, but when I look at the disk management for my new hard disk drive, it seems XP has created one hell of a mess with the partitions.

So my first problem is I can't delete these small bits or add them or do anything. I'm not sure how to get it back to how it was. It's just a mess, and I'm not comfortable with it.

My second problem is how to install Windows XP on the partitions. I really don't want to try again today, because I've been tearing my hair out all day. But is it possible to install Windows XP from within the Windows 7 environment? Or do I need to boot from the XP cd? I do need to install both Chinese XP and English XP, for testing purposes for some of the software I am writing.

I'd appreciate any advice!!!

 

[Daegan]

Start again. Set up your partition structure beforehand, don't let Windows 7 do it automatically (you don't need a system recovery partition and it's using one of your 3 primary partitions). Do your XP installs before Windows 7 if you're using Windows' own bootloader.

Or if the software you're testing isn't that demanding consider using VirtualBox or suchlike and running a couple of XP virtual machines.

 

[bledd]

+1 to Virtualbox

Install Windows 7 on a 65gb partition, then create a second partition with the rest of the drive (total of 2 partitions)

In Windows 7, install Virtualbox, then in that create 2x machines for the XP installs.

It's way way easier than you expect it to be, everything just 'works'

 

[Anchundan]

Start again. Set up your partition structure beforehand, don't let Windows 7 do it automatically (you don't need a system recovery partition and it's using one of your 3 primary partitions). Do your XP installs before Windows 7 if you're using Windows' own bootloader.

Or if the software you're testing isn't that demanding consider using VirtualBox or suchlike and running a couple of XP virtual machines.

Thanks, I probably will start again, just not yet. It's taken me days to set up Windows 7 to exactly how I want, and to lose it all today makes me want to throw my PC out the window. Also, I'm a little busy with work so will do it when not so busy.

I'm not familiar with Virtualbox, so will check it out. I will probably need to install a Chinese version of Windows XP though, as my girlfriend uses my PC when I'm away on business with the laptop. And she doesn't understand PC's at all well, nor English, so I normally get it to default to Chinese XP when I go away.

The strange thing is, I followed the same method of installation as when I installed Windows 7 RC, so really not sure what's different this time round.

 

[bledd]

Chuck your W7 disc in, you might just be able to repair the boot with it (boot from the cd)

 

[Anchundan]

I did manage to repair the boot in the end, but no thanks to the W7 disc. I had to get my old drive back in, reboot into W7 RC, and use EasyBCD to try to get the correct settings. After several frustrating hours, I managed to get it all back again.