Supporting Multiple-Boot Options

You may want to install Windows XP Professional but still be able to run other operating systems.

Dual-booting or multi-booting allows your computer to boot multiple operating systems. Your

computer will be automatically configured for dual-booting if there was a supported operating

system on your computer prior to the Windows XP Professional installation (and you didn’t

upgrade from that operating system).

One reason for dual-booting is to test various systems. If you have a limited number of computers

in your test lab, and you want to be able to test multiple configurations, you dual-boot.

For example, you might configure one computer to multi-boot with Windows NT 4 Workstation,

Windows NT 4 Server configured as a Primary Domain Controller (PDC), Windows 2000

Professional, and Windows XP Professional.

Another reason to set up dual-booting is for software backward compatibility. For example,

you may have an application that works with Windows 98 but not under Windows XP

Professional. If you want to use Windows XP but still access your legacy application, you can

configure a dual-boot.

Here are some keys to successful dual-boot configurations:

_ Make sure you have plenty of disk space. It’s a good idea to put each operating system on

a separate partition, although this is not required.

_ Put the simplest operating systems on first. If you want to support dual-booting with DOS

and Windows XP Professional, DOS must be installed first. If you install Windows XP

Professional first, you cannot install DOS without ruining your Windows XP configuration.

This requirement also applies to Windows 9x and Windows 2000.

_ Never, ever, upgrade to Windows XP dynamic disks. Dynamic disks are seen only by

Windows 2000 and Windows XP, and are not recognized by any other operating system,

including Windows NT.

_ Do not convert your file system to NTFS if you are planning a dual-boot with any operating

system except Windows NT, Windows 2000, or Windows XP. These operating systems

are the only ones that recognize NTFS.

_ If you will dual-boot with Windows NT, you must turn off disk compression, or Windows XP

will not be able to read the drive properly.