[just4kickz]

Originally Posted by FirstClass

Ummm you do know that changing partitions requires a reformat, right?

You mean different partition, no?

...when you install another OS the partioned space is the space that has been used and the unpartioned space is the free space on the hard drive. if you want an entirely fresh drive, then you would delete the partioned drive and reinstall windows, which would also mean reformating the entire drive.

i'm pretty sure you can install another OS on the unpartioned part of the drive... i used to have windows 98, and 2000 on my other computer... now it has 2000 and xp.

if your a computer expert, then shit maybe your right--i'm not... i only know as much as i've experimented.

[scottwww]

Originally Posted by FirstClass

I take it you've never seen what Partition Magic does to computers when it screws up.

I've never used Partition Magic, but I use Acronis Disk Director all the time flawlessly. I mentioned the PowerQuest software because it seems to be the most well known. I know that it had a lot of problems back in the days of Windows 95, but that was then. Does it really still?

Some of the more complex scenarios can get confusing. Try using a SATA RAID5, another SATA RAID0, a single SCSI drive, and a couple of PATA drives all in one box, multi-booting Windows XP, another instance of Windows XP, SuSE Linux and another bootable partition for testing. This is my current configuration at home.

[toofasttooslow]

Originally Posted by FirstClass

Ummm you do know that changing partitions requires a reformat, right?

You mean different partition, no?

Actually no. There is a way to install Windows on top of itself on the same partition. It is unsupported , relatively undocumented and can cause system instability. But if it's only to recover files before wiping it anyway, there shouldn't be a problem.

With that said however, this is fairly experimental and is not guaranteed to work. It might in fact make things worse and your system might not boot at all. I've done it several times and have never had an issue, but I've heard horror stories about doing it as well so proceed at your own risk.

If this doesn't sound like an option to you then I suggest building a PE (Preinstalled environment) based upon another system you have. The PE is basically a live cd with the same Windoze GUI we've all come to love. Knoppix is great if you know what you're doing,but for someone completely unfamiliar with UNIX I would not recommend attempting to recover files and learn a bit about KDE/GNOME/Fluxbox at the same time. Bart's PE can do the same with a Windows Explorer interface. All you need is a blank CD, a system running Windows and a copy of the intital installation files (off the setup CD).

Bart's PE can be found here:

http://www.nu2.nu/pebuilder/

If you want to attempt the dual boot on one single partition I've also included the steps below. These are the steps I use to isntall Windows twice on the same partition.

Assumptions :

1) XP home will act the same way as XP pro does with the installation path
2) You have a valid serial key for your XP Home or Pro installation
3) Your drive is part of a standard PATA/EIDE bus and NOT part of a RAID array or SCSI bus

Steps to single partition multi boot:

1) Welcome to Setup Screen
You want the "To set up Windows XP now, press Enter" option
press enter

2)EULA screen
Press F8

3) Windows XP Setup Screen
You want the "continue installing fresh copy of Windows XP without repairing, press esc" option
Make sure the c:\windows is highlighted and press 'esc'

4)Select c: Partition1 or whatever it's called on your system and press 'enter' to install onto this partition

5)You'll get a warning screen telling you that installing multiple OS's on the same partition is unsupported
Select 'C' to continue setting up on the current partition

6)"Setup will install windows XP on partition"

If all went well you should see a C partiion
Choose option "Leave the current file system intact (no changes)"
press 'enter' when selected

7)"Caution: A \Windows folder already exists..."
Choose "to use a different folder press 'esc'"
press 'esc'

8)"Setup needs to copy Windows XP files onto your hard disk..."

Change the setup folder from \WINDOWS to \WINNT
Then press 'enter'

Wait for all files to be copied

Go through the 'normal' setup GUI - admin name, serial key, etc

Windows should now boot to the new Windows by default. If it does not you can modify the boot.ini file to represent that.