If you want to install Vista onto an XP computer, try the reverse tutorial: Dual Boot XP and Vista (XP already installed)

I'm not going to post any stats on XP, if you're running Vista, you certainly can run XP

*You will need your XP and Vista installation discs!

Step 1 - Partition the Drive:
Vista comes with a nice partitioning tool, so i'll be using it instead of partition magic this time around.
-right-click computer under the start menu and choose "manage"


-right-click the drive you want to partition, and select "Shrink Partition"
-The amount you shrink the partition is the amount of space used for the XP partition, so i would suggest making it at least 3-4GB in size, as a full XP installation will take 1.5GB on it's own.

-now right-click the unallocated memory and select new basic partition.


-Choose NTFS file system, this will save formatting before installation.
-name the drive anything you like, i chose "XP"
-click next on the rest of the screens and finish.

once the formatting is finished you will have something like this:

*this new partition is where your XP installation will go, so take note of it's location, in case there are multiple partitions on the drive (there will now be atleast 2).

Step 2 - Install XP:


wait while XP installs (I won't go into detail, there are many tutorials on this, and it is reasonably straight forward)


Now that XP has installed, it attempts to boot for the first time... all goes fine, video settings, networking, then the lovely welcome screen as usual.

You restart, expecting a boot loader screen... followed the tutorial this far, and now you seem to only have XP... well not quite, I wouldn't leave you hanging without giving you a proper dual boot.



here lies the only real issue with installing XP after Vista, but it's a quick fix if you have your Vista CDs/DVD handy.

The problem is that Vista and XP use different boot loader utilities in the MBR (Master Boot Record) of your hard drive. XP does not recognize Vista, but Vista will recognize XP, so we need to remove the boot loader that XP just put in with the old Vista boot loader. So restart once more, but this time with your Vista disc in the drive.

Step 3 - Fix Boot Loader:
Vista will load the GUI files, and then display the loading splash screen.

-Click "Next" on the first screen
-Once the "Install Now" menu (do not click Install Now) choose "Repair Your Computer":


-You will be prompted to choose the OS to repair. Don't worry if Vista is the only OS that shows up, even after a search.

click "Next"

-I realize there is a "Fix Startup" option, but it's been my experience that it doesn't work, and this method will.
-choose to open a "Command Prompt":


type in the command prompt the following 2 lines (separatly):
Bootrec.exe /fixMBR
Bootrec.exe /fixBoot


-close the prompt and restart
-now that Vista controls your boot loader, the process is mostly finished, now we need to inform Vista that XP is installed, as to enable the boot loader selection screen.
*There are programs such as VistaBootPRO that will do this for you, but it requires .NET framework, etc, so I did it the manual way.

Step 4 - Edit boot.ini:
In Vista, the boot.ini is not editable directly, as the file itself is hard to locate, so we will be modifying it through "Boot Configuration Data Store Editor" bcdedit.exe:
(Just as an explanation, the loader type for XP is an NT Loader, hence the use of ntldr)

-first open a command prompt with administrative privilages (right-click and choose "run as administrator")
*Note the following 2 answers from bcdedit for each item are acceptable:
"The Operation Completed Successfully"
"The Specified Entry Already Exists"
Be sure to type each line carefully (replace C in the first line with the drive containing your Vista installation):
bcdedit –set {ntldr} device partition=C:
bcdedit –set {ntldr} path \ntldr
bcdedit –displayorder {ntldr} –addlast
bcdedit -set {ntldr} description "Microsoft Windows XP"

The completed bcdedit file should resemble this:


-This will correctly add XP to your boot sequence, and even name it properly instead of "Earlier Version of Windows"
-the displayorder line also allows the entry to be visible under the advanced settings of your computer properties.



Vista is the default boot, if you wish to change this to XP it can be done by setting {current} to addlast, or under the computer -> properties -> advanced settings.

If all done properly, XP and Vista will dual boot properly!

Awesome tutorial man.

thanks, i copied the data i had in the bcdedit file from writting the other tutorial so as i could figure out what to add to the bootloader (a little bit of cheating, but saved me a lot of reading on the MS site)
There is a debug option in the boot file which i left out for XP, since it never really comes into play... and if it does.. let's just say the OS is toast anyway.

when i try to install xp in unloads all the files blah blah and the crashes to blue screen.. help

Please william, I tried doing the dual boot, but I have this problem: I did the partition just as illustrated, I partitioned my second hard drive (d:) the vista is on the first drive.
when I try installing windows xp, it says my computer doesn't have any hard drives. I have an HP pavilion dv9000t notebook with dual 120 gb hard drives, intel core 2 duo T7200 @2.0 GHz, 2 GB RAM, 512 MB nVIDIA Go 7600

Hard drives are: FUJITSU MHW2120BH ATA DEVICE (2 of these).

thank you so much for your help

Smasher

Are you talking about two physical drives, or a single drive with dual partitions?
Do both drives show up in the bios?
What file system type are the drives formated with?

Based on what i've read on your laptop, it only supports SATA drives, and yes #2pencil it does support 2 physical drives.

XP has been known to have issues installing on SATA drives.
The drivers which hopefully came with your computer will be necessary. When setup begins you are given the option to install other drivers and you will need to install your SATA drivers so XP can find your drives. If you have a floppy use that, otherwise you will need to search the driver cd or manufacturers website for your drivers.

I was finally able to do it, but when I got to the final step, (bcdedit -set {ntldr} device partition=C: (and so on)
it gave me this error:
An error occured while attempting to reference the specified entry. The system cannot find the file specified.

Any ideas?

thanks

In the odd case the entry does need to be created first, try using:
bcdedit /create {ntldr} /d "Microsoft Windows XP"
first, then type the commands listed in the tutorial
-NOTE you will not need to run the command to name the entry as this will do it already.

If this does not solve your problem please post the output of bcdedit.exe

Worked like a charm! I'm soooooooooooooo grateful. Even my laptop was so happy it wanted to buy me some beer! I can't thank you enough! You're the man!

Smasher

This is Smasher again. I had to disable the native SATA support in the BIOS before my winxp cd could recognize the HDDs. Now when I re-enable it, vista works fine, but xp shows the BSOD (blue screen of death) Anyone know how I can do that? HP Pavilion dv9000t customisable, 2gig ram, 2 120gb hard drives, disk 0 has 2 partitions c: and e: witth vista on c: and hp recovery on e: disk 1 has 2 partitions d: and f: winxp is on f:

Anu help will be highly appreciated

Smasher

I recently bought a new desktop computer and am finding (as I'm sure others are) that Vista is really cool, but torture on anything made before, well, April 2007! I just read this post and noted that you can partition the current hard drive to dual-boot. But what about a SECONDARY hard drive? I have access to a second hard drive and would be interested in loading XP on that one, if possible. Are there steps that I would need to take to do this? Any potential problems forseen? Please help, thx!!

Samsher:
what is the error on the BSoD, please be specific.

bis_003:
All drives are seen as partitions to a modern OS, it will be exactly the same installing on 2 hdds as opposed to partitioning the first.

what is we do not have he original Vista DVD? my laptop came with vista instaled an did not come with a vista dvd, so how would we get around this (have been reading alot of people with same problem accross the web? thanks in advace guys.

Hi. With a pre-installed Vista on my desktop computer, I tried adding XP to make it dualboot following the tuturial. Everything worked out well until I got to the point where I was at the command prompt to type the bootrec.exe command.

Bootrec.exe /fixMBR was successful. But when I typed Bootrec.exe /fixBoot, it said to make sure that all drivers are loaded and the volume is not corrupt. I tried booting it from the hard disk but it still boots up on XP. I don't think the volume is corrupt (C:) since it used to boot from Vista till I installed XP. I checked C: and everything still seemed intact.

So I seem to have hit a blank wall. Would appreciate the help.

Thanks!

monl

are these separate drives or partitions?
Also does it involve SATA drives by chance?

Hi William. Thanks for replying.

Yes, two separate partitions of more than 70GB each on a single drive. Vista was pre-installed on partition 1 (C:) and I installed XP on partition 2 (H:).

Nope, no SATA drives.

greetings,

allright i have a bootloader problem of my own and was hoping to get some support...

to brief you as to my problem:

my dad got a fancy pants new computer a few months ago and got vista home premium

he got tired of half his drivers etc. not working, so he got me to install xp for a dual boot.

now he has a 2 sata hd setup with one partition per hd (dvr as primary master, vista hd third master, xp fourth master)

i popped in the xp cd and started the install process to the second hd, no problem. when it went to reboot to actually install the os it said no operating system found; i assumed it had something to do with the hd setup, so to make my life easier i unplugged the vista hd and left only the destination xp drive plugged in. install went fine except for some drivers missing.

so anyways, i had xp up and running, booting fine with no vista hd but wanted to add the vista hd back so i could configure the dual boot. now i forget exactly which order i did it, but when i set it up to boot from the vista hd i got the same no operating system. when it was set to boot from the xp hd xp loaded fine with vista set as drive D: or F: (i forget; dont think its important but can go look if needed). i forget how i managed it, but i got it to where now if i have it set to boot from the vista hd (as i would like it to) vista will boot up fine, but no xp... if i have it set to boot from the xp hd, then xp will boot fine, but no vista.

i installed vistabootpro or whatever the program is called and it at least thought it found the xp installation, but it doesnt work.

to finalize, here is where i stand now:
depending on which hd i have set to boot from, that os will boot fine.
if i boot to the vista hd i have the option between vista (which works) and a bunch of different xp tries i made with vistabootpro (none of which work)

i want to boot from the vista hd, have the vista bootloader ask to boot to either vista or xp

i just need help setting up the bootloader, and for the life of me i cant get it to work...

ive tried messing with the "windows legacy editor" or whatever from vistabotpro, but i dont know how i should modify the boot paramaters to set xp to boot from the first partition on the second second hd (but not neccicarily the second device)

basically i want to know how to set up the "boot.ini" (from vista) essentially for the xp install

"multi(X)disk(Y)rdisk(Z)partition(Q)..blah blah"
i just want to know maybe what i should put for those variables...
i know its the first partition, but is that a 1 or a 0? (im used to grub so im a bit thrown off)

btw, i dont have a vista cd, but i may be able to scheme one up... and if it would be easiest to set to boot xp hd, load up vista cd, then set up bootloader from vista cd, let me know




hope i didnt confuse anyone; i tried to be as specific as possible. if more details or whatever are needed let me know

monl:
try running the XP cd to repair the XP ntdlr files, sounds like there is an issue, then try to replace with the Vista boot loader again.

peedee:
You're gonna need to be specific on the bootloader if you want help setting it up.
Assuming that XP is on the first:
then Vista is:
multi(1)disk(1)rdisk(0)partition(0)
You will need to check under your BIOS which drive is being determined as drive 0, also with unplugging a drive to install, the XP will install itself as drive(0), when the new settings of plugging in your other drive, may have made it drive(1). Not that this matters much, as the XP boot.ini does not control this behavior. You will need to be careful in this matter as with multiple partitions on a single drive, both boot sectors are in the first partition (no matter the # of partitions/OSs), while on separate drives, the boot sectors are location on the first partition of each drive.

Hi William,

My apologies. Upon second look/checking, you're right, it's a SerialATA drive. So, do you think my problem related to the drive being SATA? What do you think I need to do?

Sorry bout that.

Thanks and cheers,

MonL

Okay, so i attempted this fix. Added a partition, pulled out my XP disks, attempted to load it. Wouldn't allow me to do it! Iniatially, the computer wouldn't allow me to use the "Install XP" key, but I turn on the User Accounts program, logged in as Admin, and was able to Install. However, it continued to state that the OS that I'm currently using will not allow me to add an older OS. So, I restarted, booted from the XP disk, and GOT THE SAME ERROR! Help please!

Nice article .. but it gone abit wrong at the end on rename somehow as followed, it changes my Vista Ult to the XP and left Earlier Version on.
Please help

bis_003 and kazie, can you be more specific about your problems?



It has come to my attention that the device boot option needs to be set on some machines. If you are receiving an ntldr error message when booting XP, please amend the bcdedit section to include an extra line:

bcdedit –set {ntldr} device partition=C:
bcdedit –set {ntldr} device boot
bcdedit –set {ntldr} path \ntldr
bcdedit –displayorder {ntldr} –addlast

(line 2 is the added line)

William,

Thanks for the help with dual-booting Vista and XP. I took your advice with the manual fix. My laptop came with Vista Premium installed, so I don't have a Vista boot CD; however, I used your idea of configuring the boot.ini file with the "Boot Configuration Data Store Editor." It worked and I am forever grateful. Thanks again.

Mike Hunter,
San Angelo, TX

I just bought a Toshiba A200-S01 in which i was told the new model to hit the streets and it has two drive's.
The first drive has vista on it and the second drive is empty.
I have partitioned the second drive with partition manager and booted from the CD and entered setup,but when i try to select a drive to install on it says.
"Setup did not find any hard disk drives installed in your computer"

i dont know what to do?

I having been running Vista Home edition successfully on a 500GB SATA drive for some time and read a number of articles on VISTA +XP dual boot and decided to try it. I had no problem using the Vista partition tool and crated a 40GB partition to loaded XP Home. Checked that the now (D:) partition was present after reboot, then proceeded to reboot again using the XP Home installation CD. The installation seemed to be successfully and the system rebooted again but now the boot hangs at the ACPI Controller.
I have heard some mention of SATA drive issues but can someone please clarify if this is normal and if I have anyway to solve the problem without reformatting the disc and trying again. Another option could be to buy an old type ATA drive?

Thanks Martyn534

I would just like to say that you and your tutorial are wonderful. It was very easy to understand and worked like a charm. I wish I'd found your tutorial first it would have saved me from several hours of extreme frustration.
Thanks,
Lauren

Hi guys, that's exactly what I needed so thanks for that!!!

I have only another question. I do have XP installation disc but I don't have my Vista installation cd (you know they sell those laptops with vista by default and don't give us the vista installation cd...). Anyways, I phoned them about the cd and asked them if they can afford me this Vista installation cd. They can't afford it but they told me that a restore cd might work (you know the restore tool from system tools...). I want to know what you guys think about it. Can it work or should I buy this vista installation cd?

THANKS!
P-O

Yes Dude, Have a problem. Done all the above no problem. But when I get to Booting up with the XP CD it tell me there is not HD in the system. Try it with 80gb patrition then 40gb but it just not read my partition from xp boot cd.

I have a HP Pavilion DV9000 series. I tried booting up with 2003 server disk as well, but it also tell me there is no Partition or HD on the system. Cant install if there is no HD. The only option windows XP give me is F3 to Exit ReStart. When I am in Vista the partition is there. I formated it as NTFS Partition 2 and mount it as Drive D.

Please help.