crreating dual boot vista xp

When installing vista beta does it automatically create a dual boot option (if I am using xp when I install)? The reason that I ask is that I want to evaluate vista on my home pc but my wife uses it a lot for church matters and quite often uses the printer (hp photosmart 1000), this printer does not work with vista, so I need the xp option for her to be able to use the printer. If it doesn't create a dual partition, Is this option open to me?

You need to create a new partition yourself. Try Norton PartitionMagic 8 ($70.00).
"T5" wrote in message When installing vista beta does it automatically create a dual boot option (if I am using xp when I install)? The reason that I ask is that I want to evaluate vista on my home pc but my wife uses it a lot for church matters and quite often uses the printer (hp photosmart 1000), this printer does not work with vista, so I need the xp option for her to be able to use the printer. If it doesn't create a dual partition, Is this option open to me?

Vista setup does not create anything. It gets installed where YOU tell it to install to.
Prepare before you install. Use a third party program, such as Partition Magic 8.01 (or later) to shrink your current partition. You will need 20 gig of free space to create another primary partition used for the Vista install. Then create the new partition.
Getting another hard drive would be even better. Use it exclusively for your Vista experiment.
During setup, be certain to direct the installer to the correct drive/partition.
-- Regards,
Richard Urban Microsoft MVP Windows Shell/User (For email, remove the obvious from my address)
Quote from George Ankner: If you knew as much as you think you know, You would realize that you don't know what you thought you knew!

"T5" wrote in message

When installing vista beta does it automatically create a dual boot option (if I am using xp when I install)? The reason that I ask is that I want to evaluate vista on my home pc but my wife uses it a lot for church matters and quite often uses the printer (hp photosmart 1000), this printer does not work with vista, so I need the xp option for her to be able to use the printer. If it doesn't create a dual partition, Is this option open to me?

I bought a new hard drive, and used the drive manufacturers CD to copy an image of the old drive to the new drive. After installing the new drive as the primary master, installing the old drive as the secondary master, and making sure that I could boot from the new drive, and that my Windows 2000 operating system worked, and was installed properly, I disconnected the new drive from the system and installed Vista on the old drive.
Now although the drives can see each other ,each is entirely separate. Vista has not overwritten the Master Boot Record on the Windows 2000 operating system.
I use the BIOS to select which drive to boot from.
Todd

"T5" wrote in message

When installing vista beta does it automatically create a dual boot option (if I am using xp when I install)? The reason that I ask is that I want to evaluate vista on my home pc but my wife uses it a lot for church matters and quite often uses the printer (hp photosmart 1000), this printer does not work with vista, so I need the xp option for her to be able to use the printer. If it doesn't create a dual partition, Is this option open to me?

Do not use the computer your wife uses for church matters. Use a different computer. If things go wrong you will not be able to rollback to XP. You can partition the drive to dual boot but do not do it on a primary home computer that a member of your family relies on for anything.
"T5" wrote in message

When installing vista beta does it automatically create a dual boot option (if I am using xp when I install)? The reason that I ask is that I want to evaluate vista on my home pc but my wife uses it a lot for church matters and quite often uses the printer (hp photosmart 1000), this printer does not work with vista, so I need the xp option for her to be able to use the printer. If it doesn't create a dual partition, Is this option open to me?

Why should people have to SPEND MONEY on a program like Partition Magic?
Control Panel>Adminstrative Tools>Computer Management>Disk management
Does it for a nice price like FREE! \ "Richard Urban" wrote in message

Vista setup does not create anything. It gets installed where YOU tell it to install to.
Prepare before you install. Use a third party program, such as Partition Magic 8.01 (or later) to shrink your current partition. You will need 20 gig of free space to create another primary partition used for the Vista install. Then create the new partition.
Getting another hard drive would be even better. Use it exclusively for your Vista experiment.
During setup, be certain to direct the installer to the correct drive/partition.
-- Regards,
Richard Urban Microsoft MVP Windows Shell/User (For email, remove the obvious from my address)
Quote from George Ankner: If you knew as much as you think you know, You would realize that you don't know what you thought you knew!

"T5" wrote in message When installing vista beta does it automatically create a dual boot option (if I am using xp when I install)? The reason that I ask is that I want to evaluate vista on my home pc but my wife uses it a lot for church matters and quite often uses the printer (hp photosmart 1000), this printer does not work with vista, so I need the xp option for her to be able to use the printer. If it doesn't create a dual partition, Is this option open to me?

Because it does things the way they want them done.
"Jim Fraas" wrote in message

Why should people have to SPEND MONEY on a program like Partition Magic?
Control Panel>Adminstrative Tools>Computer Management>Disk management
Does it for a nice price like FREE! \ "Richard Urban" wrote in message Vista setup does not create anything. It gets installed where YOU tell it to install to.
Prepare before you install. Use a third party program, such as Partition Magic 8.01 (or later) to shrink your current partition. You will need 20 gig of free space to create another primary partition used for the Vista install. Then create the new partition.
Getting another hard drive would be even better. Use it exclusively for your Vista experiment.
During setup, be certain to direct the installer to the correct drive/partition.
-- Regards,
Richard Urban Microsoft MVP Windows Shell/User (For email, remove the obvious from my address)
Quote from George Ankner: If you knew as much as you think you know, You would realize that you don't know what you thought you knew!

"T5" wrote in message When installing vista beta does it automatically create a dual boot option (if I am using xp when I install)? The reason that I ask is that I want to evaluate vista on my home pc but my wife uses it a lot for church matters and quite often uses the printer (hp photosmart 1000), this printer does not work with vista, so I need the xp option for her to be able to use the printer. If it doesn't create a dual partition, Is this option open to me?

Use GParted. It's free and does and excellent job. It can be downloaded at http://gparted.sourceforge.net/livecd.php. You do have to burn it to a CD.
"Jim Fraas" wrote:

Why should people have to SPEND MONEY on a program like Partition Magic?
Control Panel>Adminstrative Tools>Computer Management>Disk management
Does it for a nice price like FREE! \ "Richard Urban" wrote in message Vista setup does not create anything. It gets installed where YOU tell it to install to.
Prepare before you install. Use a third party program, such as Partition Magic 8.01 (or later) to shrink your current partition. You will need 20 gig of free space to create another primary partition used for the Vista install. Then create the new partition.
Getting another hard drive would be even better. Use it exclusively for your Vista experiment.
During setup, be certain to direct the installer to the correct drive/partition.
-- Regards,
Richard Urban Microsoft MVP Windows Shell/User (For email, remove the obvious from my address)
Quote from George Ankner: If you knew as much as you think you know, You would realize that you don't know what you thought you knew!

"T5" wrote in message When installing vista beta does it automatically create a dual boot option (if I am using xp when I install)? The reason that I ask is that I want to evaluate vista on my home pc but my wife uses it a lot for church matters and quite often uses the printer (hp photosmart 1000), this printer does not work with vista, so I need the xp option for her to be able to use the printer. If it doesn't create a dual partition, Is this option open to me?

Still costs money I would rather spend on something else,like the RTM version. :)
"Colin Barnhorst" wrote in message

Because it does things the way they want them done.
"Jim Fraas" wrote in message Why should people have to SPEND MONEY on a program like Partition Magic?

"Jim Fraas" wrote in message

Still costs money I would rather spend on something else,like the RTM version. :)
"Colin Barnhorst" wrote in message Because it does things the way they want them done.
"Jim Fraas" wrote in message Why should people have to SPEND MONEY on a program like Partition Magic?

You are not required to get partition magic to dual boot Vista with XP and it works well. Just follow the clear directions from Richard Urban or that Colin has posted many times on this group or I have posted a few times:
After you burn the Iso, while you are in XP, the setup for Vista will pop up on your screen. You get the chance to direct to the partition you want.
You can make partitions with Diskmanager; but it is not fault tolerant and so if you want to extend them or make new ones without losing things you can 1) Backup 2) Use 3rd party.
I don't think you'll be successful in getting MSFT to build it in. It'd be great and you can try.
CH
"Jim Fraas" wrote in message

Still costs money I would rather spend on something else,like the RTM version. :)
"Colin Barnhorst" wrote in message Because it does things the way they want them done.
"Jim Fraas" wrote in message Why should people have to SPEND MONEY on a program like Partition Magic?

Jim--
We know what Disk Management does really well. We also know something you ommitted. It ain't fault tolerant. What that means is sure, it will create a partition for you--but the OP wanted to dual boot XP and didn't want to lose his XP. Disk Management is not fault tolerant and it's not going to retain data if it partitions that hard drive.
CH
"Jim Fraas" wrote in message

Why should people have to SPEND MONEY on a program like Partition Magic?
Control Panel>Adminstrative Tools>Computer Management>Disk management
Does it for a nice price like FREE! \ "Richard Urban" wrote in message Vista setup does not create anything. It gets installed where YOU tell it to install to.
Prepare before you install. Use a third party program, such as Partition Magic 8.01 (or later) to shrink your current partition. You will need 20 gig of free space to create another primary partition used for the Vista install. Then create the new partition.
Getting another hard drive would be even better. Use it exclusively for your Vista experiment.
During setup, be certain to direct the installer to the correct drive/partition.
-- Regards,
Richard Urban Microsoft MVP Windows Shell/User (For email, remove the obvious from my address)
Quote from George Ankner: If you knew as much as you think you know, You would realize that you don't know what you thought you knew!

"T5" wrote in message When installing vista beta does it automatically create a dual boot option (if I am using xp when I install)? The reason that I ask is that I want to evaluate vista on my home pc but my wife uses it a lot for church matters and quite often uses the printer (hp photosmart 1000), this printer does not work with vista, so I need the xp option for her to be able to use the printer. If it doesn't create a dual partition, Is this option open to me?

I was able to do that. :) I dual boot with XP.
"Chad Harris" <Bushisamoron.net> wrote in message

Jim--
We know what Disk Management does really well. We also know something you ommitted. It ain't fault tolerant. What that means is sure, it will create a partition for you--but the OP wanted to dual boot XP and didn't want to lose his XP. Disk Management is not fault tolerant and it's not going to retain data if it partitions that hard drive.
CH

Disk management in Vista has shrink and expand partitions, XP didn't that I was able to find.
"Jim Fraas" wrote in message

I was able to do that. :) I dual boot with XP.
"Chad Harris" <Bushisamoron.net> wrote in message Jim--
We know what Disk Management does really well. We also know something you ommitted. It ain't fault tolerant. What that means is sure, it will create a partition for you--but the OP wanted to dual boot XP and didn't want to lose his XP. Disk Management is not fault tolerant and it's not going to retain data if it partitions that hard drive.
CH

Jim--
Posts like you just made are worthless because the pronouns don't convey anything. I have no idea what "I was able to do that means." I know you weren't able to use Diskmgmt.msc from run in XP and get fault tolerance.
You were able to do precisely what on what with what???? In XP diskmanagement is not fault tolerant. So I have no idea what you're talking about. Disk Management *in Vista* may be different in that regard. I haven't done anything with DM in Vista but used it to view. When I format for a new build, I do it from XP and Disk Management works fine to format my Vista partition, and I run setup from within XP because I like the way it retains my drive letters and find it convenient--I've also formatted from cmd to compare them.
CH
"Jim Fraas" wrote in message

I was able to do that. :) I dual boot with XP.
"Chad Harris" <Bushisamoron.net> wrote in message Jim--
We know what Disk Management does really well. We also know something you ommitted. It ain't fault tolerant. What that means is sure, it will create a partition for you--but the OP wanted to dual boot XP and didn't want to lose his XP. Disk Management is not fault tolerant and it's not going to retain data if it partitions that hard drive.
CH