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Dual operating systems on 1 computer

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electrogeek

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I currently have installed in my computer a 20 giga-byte hard drive(Drive C) that has Windows 98 SE installed on it. I'm considering about installing a second 60 giga-byte hard drive(Drive D) on my computer. The question is "Can I install Windows 2000 on my second hard drive while keeping Windows 98 SE on my first hard drive if so would it be also possible to have installed a third 100 giga-byte hard drive on my computer split it into two parts and use this third hard drive ( Drives E and F) as a backup for(Drives C and D) just as long as I keep the two operating systems seperate from each other?"
 
My Bios allows me to choose wich drive to boot from
(IDE-0, IDE-1,... ). If your bios allows this to then you could just install the second OS on the second hard drive and tell your bios wich drive to use for boot

If you want to setup multiple OS'es on one drive. You can make multiple partitions on one drive and install an os on each partition. There are free PC bootloaders on the net wich allow you to choose wich partition to boot from
 
partition

try looking into the prgoram called Partition Magic

also - why even bother with 98/2000? I was always reluctant switching up, but trust me - win XP is the way to go (although I still keep win 2000 theme)
 
Dear electrogeek,
You can install Win2000 on your second new drive. When you insert your install disc, a windows wizzard will ask you whether you wanna upgrade your OS or install in different drive. If you want to install two OSs in your computer then you should 'install other drive' but not 'upgrade windows'. The win2000 will automatically create a menu after you completely install it and reboot your system. Thereafer, everytime you switch on your computer, there is the menu let you to choice which OS your wanna boot.
 
As Isotope has already said, it's very easy to do - when you install either 2000 or XP it gives you the option of overwriting your existing OS or a new install - it even creates an option menu at start up.

Installing Linux does the same, it would be quite possible (and easy) to have three options at start up, 98, 2000, and Linux.

One thing to be aware of is the different disk formats, 2000/XP will be able to read the 98 disk, but 98 won't be able to read the 2000/XP disk. With 2000 I think you may be able to set it to use the Win98 format, but I think XP will only use NTFS - but I'm no expert on 2000 or XP, Win98 rules :twisted:

I do have a dual boot machine with 98 and XP (main boot in 98), basically for checking WinPicProg compatibility under XP (none of the NT based Windows appear to work quite right! - a perfectly legal Delphi program wouldn't work, and required modifying - it was a really obscure problem!).
 
Where would I find the Program called Partition Magic at?

As far as Windows XP is concerned I had thought about installing Windows XP but after working at the fat cow better known as Gateway Computers and seeing how Windows XP operated I truly did not like it. I thought it was garbage. Windows XP has fairly good graphics like Windows 2000 where is Windows 98 does not have good graphics. Windows XP, like Windows 2000, lacks some of the DOS utilities that Windows 98 has. Windows XP, unlike Windows 98 and 2000, was at the time too unstable for me to even want to be bothered with such headaches that Windows XP had to offer.
 
multi-boot

For anyone who wants to set up multi-boot operating systems, check out XOSL (uses the excellent Ranish partition manager).

**broken link removed** & http://xosl.sourceforge.net/

I experimented with several flavors of linux over the summer http://www.distrowatch.com/ and also wanted to run Windows and DOS programs off the same hard disk. After trying several freeware/shareware multi-boot packages, I found XOSL - it's simple and works well.
 
Dual boot will work fine, just watch out if you access any file in NTFS with 98 - 2000 or you might have problems. Best just use FAT32 thoughout or stay away from each OS drive or partition. I'd go with the second option myself.
 
I Dual Boot Win xp And Slackware 9.0 (Linux) on a single drive, All Is two partition's on the drive. A linux partition and a windows partition. With linux all you so is use a program called LiLO with stands for linux loader and you install it to The Mbr of the drive and have a choice to boot Windows or linux at startup. You can use fdisk for windows and fdisk for linux to set up the partitions, or partition magic to create the different partition's for free space on your drive with having to reinstall anything!

Win Xp,2000 can use Fat32 or NTFS file system, NTFS just allows you to encyrpt files which is good to have 8)

Linux uses the ext2 file system


LINUX OWNZ YOU ALL! :D
 
After reading some of the responses I'm thinking strongly about taking advantage of the Promise Card( off board I/O ports) that I got installed in my computer and install a Win98/Win2000/Linux dual operating system so this way I can have access to all kinds of programs. Most importantly is the fact that I still have the simplicity of Win98 while having the professionalism of Win2000, and Linux all in one. Who knows I might even switch over if I like the new O/S.
 
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