drive partitioning for dual boot

[janusz]

Greetings!

Situation
I want to install Win 98SE from my old drive (disk image restore) to new larger hard drive and dual boot with Win 2000 Pro. Exisiting hard drive contains Win 98SE partitioned as follows: C, D, E, F (primary partition with logical drives within extended partition). Win 2000 Pro is to be a new installation.

Partitioning scheme 1
If I partition the new hard drive as primary with logical drives and move (drive image) Win 98SE to the new drive then the partition setup would be the same as on the older drive: C, D, E, F. It is my understanding that if I want to install Win 2000 Pro then it would have to be on another logical drive, ie, G. Then would have to set G as the active partition so the machine boots to Win 2000 Pro.

a. Is this correct?
b. If correct, any additional partitions I might want for Win 2000 Pro would be additional logical drives, such as H, I, etc. Is this correct?
c. How does one select the active partition? A boot loader?
d. This scheme would permit accessing files from other OSs (FAT32). For example, from Win 2000 I could access file in the other OS, Win 98. Is this correct?

Partitioning scheme 2
If I partition the new hard drive into TWO primary partitions then I could move (drive image) Win 98SE to the new drive into the desired primary partition. I would then have within that partition C, D, E, F logical drives as in the older drive except now they are within one of two primary partitions. I would then install Win 2000 Pro into the other primary partition with the system in C drive; other logical drives (D, E, F, etc.) could be added. I would have to set one primary partition as active so as to boot to that particular OS.

a. Is this correct? Is it even necessary with both Windows OSs?
b. One OS would not be able to "see" the others files. A boot loader such as Boot Magic would be required.
c. If I wante to add another OS system such as Windows ME for some reason, could it be added to the same primary partition as Win 98SE, logical drive, drive G? Would the boot loader recognise this?

Thanks,

Janusz
Age doesn't always bring wisdom. Sometimes age comes alone.
.

[SuperSparks]

You need to install Win98 on the C: drive first, which should be the active partition. Then install Win2000 on any partition that you like, primary or extended, and the Win2000 bootloader will take care of everything for you. No need at all to worry about setting any other active partitions.

http://support.microsoft.com/default...;EN-US;q217210

[janusz]

Many thanks!

It was just too easy! Much easier than I thought!!

1. Win 2000 installed its own boot loader. Works great. I tried to get PowerQuest BootMagic to work but . . . it works, kinda.

If I select Win 2000 in BootMagic menu, I get message: NTLDR not found and kicks me back to the BootMagic menu. If I then select Win 98 in the BootMagic menu, it then goes to the Win 2000 boot loader menu!! I then can select either OS!

Using the Win 2000 boot loader is no problem but my wife likes the way BootMagic looks. Me, too. :-)

Any idea on how to resolve this?

2. Curious . . . How would one remove Win 98 so as to leave only Win 2000??

Thanks!

j

[DVOM]

For BootMagic to work both OS's have to be on separate primary partitions. BM works by hiding/unhiding primary partitions. That is it hides all primary partitions except the one you've chosen to boot from.

In your case you installed w2k into a logical partition. That means that the w2k boot files were put on the only primary partition on the drive. When you use BM to choose w2k you're hiding the partition that has the w2k boot files on it.

So in your situation, BM isn't going to work.

"2. Curious . . . How would one remove Win 98 so as to leave only Win 2000??"

The reasons BM won't work here are the same reasons it's difficult to impossible to remove 98 and leave w2k. Removing 98 also removes the w2k boot files.


As for your Partitioning Scheme 2:

Instead of transferring all current partitions into a single primary partition on the new drive, you should create 2 primary partitions AND a extended partition with D, E, and F logical partitions on the new drive.

Then copy the old C: part to the first primary part on the new drive. Each of the old logical parts then get copied to the logical parts on the new drive.

At this point you use BM to choose the second primary part to boot from. (This hides the first primary part) Put in your w2k CD and install to the second primary part. The first primary part being hidden forces the w2k install to put all the boot files in the same part as the OS.

As you've said, in this case neither OS will be able to see the other. However, both OS's will be able to see and use all the logical parts.

In this scenario BM will work perfectly and you'll be able to remove either of the OS's without any problems.

[janusz]

Thanks for replying, DVOM!

Ummmm. I installed Win2k in primary partition. Win 98 and Win2k installed in separate partitions. When I installed Win2k I set that partition active. I did not do it through BootMagic.

PartitionMagic (in Win 98) shows this:

C: Primary
Extended Primary:
D: Logical
E: Logical
F: Logical

Win2k: Primary (hidden)

C: is where Win 98 is installed. Only C, D, E, F accessible/visible.

Win2k is the volume label for Win 2k installation. When in Win2k it shows as J: (Win2k). C, D, E, F are all visible and accessible.

When I installed Win2k I set the second primary partition active. I then installed Win2k. I did not do it through BootMagic.

Yes, you describe it exactly like I want it: separate isolated OSs.

1. Anyway to backtrack out of this (uninstall Win2k)? If I delete the second primary partition with Win2k and delete NTLDR and NTDETECT.com on C: of first primary, will this work?

2. If so, then I would set up second primary again with PartitionMagic. Then use BootMagic to select the empty second partition (?) and install Win2k.

Thanks,
j

[DVOM]

janusz, everything you did looks great, the only thing I do differently is at this point:

"When I installed Win2k I set the second primary partition active. I then installed Win2k. I did not do it through BootMagic."

Here you've got to also hide the first primary partition. You can do this either with BootMagic or PartitionMagic.

[janusz]

I SEE, said the blind man!!!

I was able to get Win 98 straight -- I restored mbr (FDISK /mbr) and sys c: from boot floppy. I then deleted boot.int, NTLDR, & NTDETECT.COM; then deleted the partition.

I also had to update FDISK for Win 98. It could not see all of the capacity. This had nothing to do with the dual boot but something I ran across.

Also, I used PartitionMagic to create the second primary (8GB) from a lot of unused space. As I was setting it up there was a message that it may not boot since it exceeded 1024 cylinders. I don't think it is a problem because it created it as FAT32X which, as I understand it, is an extention to get beyond 1024 cylinders with FAT32.

I'm now installing Win 2000. It was a bit scary seeing that I was installing to C: - glad I named the second partition "Win2k" or it would sure look like I could be overwriting Win98 C:

Edit: finished! Win 2k would not boot directly when selected but displayed a menu; soon figured it to be start menu-set to only Win 2k and 0 time. Works as advertised.

1. Only thing . . . the logical partition of Win 98 are visible. Any idea how to make them hidden while in Win 2k?

2. Well, two things . . . how do I add logical drives to Win 2k partition? PartitionMagic will not permit logical drive addition - greyed out. Are all logical drives shared by both OSs??

Thanks, DVOM for the instructions! Got me out of the jungle.

DVOM=Digital-Volt-Ohm-Meter?

j

[DVOM]

For your first question, you could use TweakUI in w2k to hide whatever partitions you don't want to be visible.

Second question, you can't create logical partitions within a primary partition. Logical partitions can only be created within an extended partition.

You can have only one extended partition per hard drive. So if you want/need more logical partitions you'll need to find room to expand your extended partition or shrink the sizes of the logical parts you already have.

[janusz]

Thank you for taking the time to reply! I am grateful. I never would have figured it out! I'm up and running!

Have a great week!

Kindest regards,

janusz