Need help regarding manipulating of windows installations

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Archived from groups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage (More info?)

I have a laptop containing a very well working Windows XP
installation, installed on a partition using the entire disk. But now
I have to install a company spesific XP installation on the same
laptop. This is to be installed using an unattended setup which "takes
no prisoners", meaning it will re-partition the entire disk and
install itself "all over". But I want to have both installations on my
computer and be able to select which one to use during boot. How do I
preserve the existing installation and put it back on the computer? I
can take a backup using PQ DriveCopy 4.0, but how do I put it back on
the disk AND make it work? I do have PQ Partition Magic 8.0, and I
imagine I can work it out somehow using this and BootMagic, but I'm
not sure how. Advise wanted!

Regards,
John Martin

 

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Archived from groups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage (More info?)

"John Martin" <jmk@larvikbanken.no> wrote in message
news:f84074b7.0505032249.1ecd2ada@posting.google.com...
> I have a laptop containing a very well working Windows XP
> installation, installed on a partition using the entire disk. But now
> I have to install a company spesific XP installation on the same
> laptop. This is to be installed using an unattended setup which "takes
> no prisoners", meaning it will re-partition the entire disk and
> install itself "all over". But I want to have both installations on my
> computer and be able to select which one to use during boot. How do I
> preserve the existing installation and put it back on the computer? I
> can take a backup using PQ DriveCopy 4.0, but how do I put it back on
> the disk AND make it work? I do have PQ Partition Magic 8.0, and I
> imagine I can work it out somehow using this and BootMagic, but I'm
> not sure how. Advise wanted!


See this and page 2.
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/setup/learnmore/multiboot.mspx

You will also need to find out more about your company set up because that
might prevent you dual booting.

Will you need to hide your pet installation of XP from your sys admin
people?

You will probably need to investigate boot managers..

http://archives.devshed.com/a/ng/357-126/Dual-Boot-How

 

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Archived from groups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage (More info?)

John Martin wrote:

> I have a laptop containing a very well working Windows XP
> installation, installed on a partition using the entire disk. But now
> I have to install a company spesific XP installation on the same
> laptop. This is to be installed using an unattended setup which "takes
> no prisoners", meaning it will re-partition the entire disk and
> install itself "all over". But I want to have both installations on my
> computer and be able to select which one to use during boot. How do I
> preserve the existing installation and put it back on the computer? I
> can take a backup using PQ DriveCopy 4.0, but how do I put it back on
> the disk AND make it work? I do have PQ Partition Magic 8.0, and I
> imagine I can work it out somehow using this and BootMagic, but I'm
> not sure how. Advise wanted!

If this is your personal machine that you paid for out of your own pocket,
and if they want to put their own OS on it, then they should be providing
you with _their_ hardware rather than insisting on screwing up _yours_.

Trying to run dual-boot in an environment where management wants their OS
and only their OS installed on your work machine is not a way to make
points with the boss.

> Regards,
> John Martin

--
--John
to email, dial "usenet" and validate
(was jclarke at eye bee em dot net)

 

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Archived from groups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage (More info?)

John Martin <jmk@larvikbanken.no> wrote in message
news:f84074b7.0505032249.1ecd2ada@posting.google.com...

> I have a laptop containing a very well working Windows XP
> installation, installed on a partition using the entire disk. But now
> I have to install a company spesific XP installation on the same
> laptop. This is to be installed using an unattended setup which "takes
> no prisoners", meaning it will re-partition the entire disk and
> install itself "all over". But I want to have both installations on my
> computer and be able to select which one to use during boot. How do I
> preserve the existing installation and put it back on the computer? I
> can take a backup using PQ DriveCopy 4.0, but how do I put it back on
> the disk AND make it work? I do have PQ Partition Magic 8.0, and I
> imagine I can work it out somehow using this and BootMagic, but I'm
> not sure how. Advise wanted!

It is possible to do what you want, but you need to know what you are
doing and those tools are a bit ancient for that, particularly the DriveCopy.

You will also need quite a bit of space to do it too.

The simplest approach would be to image the existing XP install,
using something like True Image 8. But that will need somewhere
to put that image, and its going to be something like half the size
of the hard drive. You can write that to say a networked desktop
drive or a USB2 drive connected to that laptop.

Then you install the company specific XP installation
and let it do what it likes to the hard drive.

Then you need to repartition the drive, basically to give you a
partition to put your own XP installation into. That could be a
problem if the hard drive isnt big enough. Partition Magic will
do that fine.

Now you restore the original image back into that new
partition, and install a boot manager to allow you to
select which XP installation to boot at boot time.

The boot manager can be done with just XP alone, not that
hard in that situation, but easier with a boot manager.

So basically you need enough space on the laptop for both
XP installations and somewhere to put the image of the current
installation and a decent modern imaging program than can
handle the NTFS formatted partitions.