Reinstalling XP over Vista

jank

My brother got a new dell there the other day. He likes the vista that it came with but wants to install xp over vista. I.E format the c: install xp, then vista for dual boot.

When i try this i get the blue screen of death. Vista will not just go away.
Im thinking im going to have to do it the other way, by install xp ontop of vista.

They say that vista comes with a partitioning tool, but i cant see where you can create a new primary partition on top of the c: drive that vista is in for xp.

Is the fdisk command a better option or will i install partition magic (not even sure will it work on vista?)

Or will i just reformat the c: and start new(I tried this but it wont let me either!?)

seamus

The rule for Microsoft OS's has always been that if you want to dual-boot, you must start by installing the the oldest OS first, and work your way up to the newest. I haven't installed the Vista release yet, only a beta. I have it dual-booting with XP, but I installed XP first.

The reason is that XP doesn't know that Vista exists. So when you attempt to install XP over Vista, it sees Vista and its boot files as being some other pesky OS (Linux or whatever), and attempts to just clean it out and use it for itself.

If you install Vista over XP though, Vista recognises XP and knows what to do with XP's boot files to allow a dual-boot.

It's probably possible to install XP second, but it will probably quicker and less stressful to just do it the right way if you can.

jank

Yea saw that rule on the MS site.

Thing is I cant get rid of Vista.

Where can I reformat the c: where vista resides so xp can be installed without trouble.

Tried to do format c: in safe mode but comes back with the error cant format system partition.
I have looked in the BIOS for something that will do this but no luck. I know the solution is staring me in the face with this one.

Nick_oliveri

jank wrote:

Tried to do format c: in safe mode but comes back with the error cant format system partition.
I have looked in the BIOS for something that will do this but no luck. I know the solution is staring me in the face with this one.

Format C: in safe mode? Restart computer with the Xp CD in the drive. You will have the option to format before you install XP. Formatting a partition/drive in use by the current OS is a bad idea/ dreadful idea.

jank

Nick_oliveri wrote:

Format C: in safe mode? Restart computer with the Xp CD in the drive. You will have the option to format before you install XP. Formatting a partition/drive in use by the current OS is a bad idea/ dreadful idea.

This is the thing if you read my post!! The XP cd doesnt give that option. ive install xp many times and this option always comes up but not when vista is already installed. Xp just goes away and tries to install itself and then crashes.

I was trying that format in safe mode (should have mentioned it was ms-dos safe mode) as an option to a few other i tried. In my head i knew it wouldnt work but wanted to rule it out.

I think my last option is to create a boot disk, put it on a usb and boot from the, format the c: then.

Anybody else think vista is a bit too locked down?

Nick_oliveri

Yeah thats a bit strange, sorry for misinterpreting your post. Thats actually really ghey, i want to get rid of this Vista too TBH but need a new XP disc. Hmm

Found this quote on another forum.

Vista has a "boot manager" which you can see in your root files. It does not use the boot.ini. The problem is lying in the mbr. Best way is to boot up your XP cd and select the recovery console (R) then, at the command line type
1. fixmbr and answer yes to the questions
2. Type fixboot and answer yes to the questions.
You can then reboot and your computer will be back to normal.

Then you should be able to go through the normal format routine using the XP Disc. Now i havent tried this. Probably be a good idea to have another computer to look up info if something goes wrong.

jank

cheers ill try that.

arseagon

I had the same problem when trying to install XP on a partition that had Vista on it. I managed to fix it by booting with a Linux install CD and allowing it to delete the partition and formatting it as a Linux partition. The rebooted with the XP Disk, removed that partition and created a new NTFS partition. It's an awful lot of bother for something that should be so simple. :mad:

RangeR

I don't understand your issue. I had Vista installed up until last night. Didn't like it so I put in my XP Pro CD and booted up. Formatted hard drive from XP Partition manager and installed no problem.

"Should" be ok once you have your BIOS set to boot off floppy first. Technically speaking, it doesn't matter what is on your computer. Booting up from CD and doing a full format will just clear it. I've done it with all flavours of Windows and Linux. Never had a problem.

When you say, MS Dos Safe mode. Is this from the Vista boot up menu. If so, then this is not right. You shouldn't load ANY part of Vista, even the boot manager.

jank

I don't understand your issue. I had Vista installed up until last night. Didn't like it so I put in my XP Pro CD and booted up. Formatted hard drive from XP Partition manager and installed no problem

My problem is I cant do that ....

Soundman

Have you gone into your BIOS and changed the boot order to CD drive first then HDD? Might help..

jank

Soundman wrote:

Have you gone into your BIOS and changed the boot order to CD drive first then HDD? Might help..

Yep!

The thing is. When i put in XP it doesnt even ask if it can install on a partition. It just tries to boot from it straight away, then crashes.

stanley1

set the bios to boot up from floppy, go to your HD manufacturer and d/l hard drive utilities file, transfer to floppy, this should give you all options, format, partion etc

stanley1

stanley1 wrote:

set the bios to boot up from floppy, go to your HD manufacturer and d/l hard drive utilities file, transfer to floppy, this should give you all options, format, partion etc

don't forget to reset bios to boot from cd

paudie

Hey guys I have the same problem as this, Vista telling me to f off when I try to boot from my XP CD, not too good with the techy stuff but I have set it to boot from CD before HD but I still get the blue screen.

Did any of the above stuff work? I don't have anything inportant on the PC just got it from Dell and though it would be easy to load up XP (hahahaha), is it really as simple as formatting with this FDISK command (again no too techy so be nice) I've seen that on other forums but no report if it worked or not.

Cheers

jank

OK I managed to sort this out and the problem afaik were the hard drives the PC came with.
The dell PC had 2 identical 250GB HD that also had a RAID controller. Now RAID wasnt configured at all but the above issue of xp not installing was still there.

So I went into the BIOS, disabled one of the HD's and hey presto it worked.
XP doesnt support RAID afaik and even though it wasnt configured at the time it still must have confused XP to such an extent it crashed. Maybe becasue they are both set to master or something like that, im sure someone will tell me anyway

If the dell you got has 2 HD's disable the 2nd one in the bios (f2) It should work then. Its a breeze after this is done

paudie

If you have a RAID capable controller you may need to set it in the BIOS to off of auto detect.

I got this from another site and it worked like a charm,
I only have the one HD but I did what it says above and now I'm in the middle of reinstalling my XP now, I'll let you know if I get anymore problems

jank

If you have a RAID capable controller you may need to set it in the BIOS to off of auto detect.

Ya i did that but the same problem was there. I messed around a good bit with the BIOS settings

Disabling one of the HD's in the BIOS was the only thing that worked for me