Jamo Posted June 28, 2011 Share Posted June 28, 2011 Hi Now I have windows 7 x64 and ubuntu 11.04 installed on my laptop. W7 was installed first and Ubuntu second. Now I would like to install Xp on that machine. I have understood that different windows versions should be installed by release order, xp first then W7. I have also heard that after installing XP to w7 laptop it might not be able to boot. Now my boot loader is grub. Is it possible to install xp so I dont need to repair install W7 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
digip Posted June 28, 2011 Share Posted June 28, 2011 Hi Now I have windows 7 x64 and ubuntu 11.04 installed on my laptop. W7 was installed first and Ubuntu second. Now I would like to install Xp on that machine. I have understood that different windows versions should be installed by release order, xp first then W7. I have also heard that after installing XP to w7 laptop it might not be able to boot. Now my boot loader is grub. Is it possible to install xp so I dont need to repair install W7 From my understanding,XP will pretty much screw up everything. Its not able to see linux, and its going to want to overwrite your MBR. You can make an NTFS partition using linux if you have spare, unused disk space, and then try installing XP to it, but you will then have to repair 7's boot files as well since 7 wants the first 20 megabytes or so of the disk for its boot loader, then when done, reinstall grub and add XP and 7 to the chainloader. Never tried installign windows after linux was already installed. Have only done Windows, then added linux, so read up on it to make sure you don't destroy anything, or back it up if you need stuff before attempting this. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Infiltrator Posted June 29, 2011 Share Posted June 29, 2011 You could install Windows XP on a virtual environment, using Vmware or Virtual box. Or add a second hard drive to your computer and install Windows XP in it, so that way you don't have to worry about space or re-sizing partition. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jamo Posted June 29, 2011 Author Share Posted June 29, 2011 You could install Windows XP on a virtual environment, using Vmware or Virtual box. Or add a second hard drive to your computer and install Windows XP in it, so that way you don't have to worry about space or re-sizing partition. Well Im going to install xp to my laptop, which has 2 250Gb hdds, yes 2 hdds, not one hdd with 2 paritions. If I remember correctly w7 and ubuntu are on the same hdd. Would it be possible to remove hdd that has w7 and ubunu on it and then install xp to the second hdd. After XP is isntalled I could just easily put second hdd back and update grub. Or since I have recently installed w7 and ubuntu to that laptop and I'v done almost no customizations its possible that I could re install everything, I even have a spare 500Gb hdd laying around, so I could switch to that and then if necessary return to this currently working situation. I have a new i7 2600 computer, which I use also for virtualization and I run multiple XP installations on it. I just would like to have xp on my laptop too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
digip Posted June 29, 2011 Share Posted June 29, 2011 I would say yes you can remove one then do the XP install, but make sure before you do that, that 7 is on Disk 0, and all its sys files, boot files, etc, are on disk 0, and that is the drive you remove. Otherwise, if the 7 OS is on drive 1, but its boot files are on 0 (7 will always try to put boot files on lowest drive ID, no matter what drive you install to), and you overwrite with XP, you would end up having to repair 7 as well. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.