Issues with what should be a simple partitioning exersize.

[roto41]

Hi,

Can anyone advise?

WIN 7 RC 7100, 350 GB HD

I decided to do without XP mode in Win 7 and do everything I could to get old software to operate under Win 7 and I've managed pretty well, updating, playing or delving around as required.

However there are two programs I can't manage without, that will not install under WIN 7 or 64bit XP mode, so I've had to bite the bullet and attempt to create a small partition, 60GB, in an attempt to install my retail version of Win XP Home which is a 32 bit OS under the FAT file system on this partition.

The new partition is reconised both in Disk Management and My Computer under Win 7 as K: and formatted a a FAT partition but have tried NTFS with the same results.

The thinking behind this was during the XP home upgrade partition set up I have to insert a Window 98SE disk for previous OS installation, (98SE wouldn't recognize NTFS hence the fat format on the partition--------well it made sense to me.

I had forgotten my version of Win XP Home was an upgrade from Win 98SE, which had me scrambling around in search of that disk.

Durring XP Home partition set up I successfully get to where I'm asked Set Up Windows, ( inserting my WIN 98SE disk for validation of a previous Win OS installed ), it then reads,

Set up Windows----------------------------------
Create Partition------------------------------------
Delete Selected Partition-------------------------

Directly under the above it reads,

Unknown disk there is no disk in this drive. ( then )

There is no disk in this drive
131072MB disk 0 at Id 0 on bus 0 on atapi [MBR] (then)

C: Partition1 [unknown] 131072MB 131071 MB free ( this line is highlighted) and to press enter.

As I don't want to overwrite My Win 7 installation I quit the installation.

I was expecting to see the new partition K: I had set up, why is the partition not showing what am I doing wrong??

Some further advise given to me was to reinstall Win XP over Win 7 RC and create a partition within XP for Win 7,.........but I'm so not sure on this approach and I have got Win 7 working just great and it's a lot of fussing around, if that doesn't work.

Is the problem the two different file systems on the same HD, as I wrote I can see the K: partition in Disk management and My Computer, I might be missing a step but I don't think I'm doing anything wrong??

I'm flummoxed, either I can create a Fat 32 bit partition within/under Win 7 or I can't.

[peterb]

Generally, when you are setting up a multiboot system you should install the oldest OS foirst. The installation will set utself up to boot itself, and so it will overwrite the boot sector anyway. Win 95/98 wasn't as sophisticated as the NT series (Win nt 3.51, nt4, Win2K and later, and those installers will recognise the presence of the older systems and adjust their own installation accordingly.

[roto41]

Hi peterb and thank you,

Generally, when you are setting up a multiboot system you should install the oldest OS foirst. The installation will set utself up to boot itself, and so it will overwrite the boot sector anyway. Win 95/98 wasn't as sophisticated as the NT series (Win nt 3.51, nt4, Win2K and later, and those installers will recognise the presence of the older systems and adjust their own installation accordingly.

Yes that's what I should have done and now I think about I vaguley remember reading excactly that somewhere, the time I've wasted on my attempts over the last couple of days.

I'm loathed to overwrite Win 7 and start again, I've got it running like a dream, in fact I won't do it.

I shall have to find away of living without only 1 of the programs I mentioned, late this evening, I managed to get one of the two fully functioning installed under Win 7, if I could get the other one to work, good buy XP Home,-------I think.

[peterb]

Run Win 98 in a virtual machine?

[Splash]

Yep, free virtualisation is your friend here

[roto41]

Run Win 98 in a virtual machine?

Hello peterb and thank you,

I know nothing about how to acheive this even under Win 7, could you give me some advise? but do remember I want to run Win XP Home and not 98 but I have to install 98SE to install my XP upgrade.

[roto41]

Yep, free virtualisation is your friend here

Thank you Splash, what is the difference between virtualisation and partition?

When you write free does that mean there is a free program available to down load?

[Splash]

Thank you Splash, what is the difference between virtualisation and partition?

When you write free does that mean there is a free program available to down load?

There's Sun Virtualbox, VMWare Server and Microsoft Virtual PC on the Windows side of things - any one of these will let you run a virtual Windows 98 machine (assuming you have install media and license!) from within your Windows session. Virtualbox is probably your best bet as someone starting out with virtualisation.

The main difference between this form of virtualisation and partitioning is that partitioning (by which I'm assuming you mean dual-booting) requires you to restart your PC to move to the other OS, virtualisation lets you run one OS "inside" another.

[iftiq]

If I've understood the issue correctly, then you want to run Windows 7 as your main OS, and run Windows XP for some programs that don't work under Windows 7. As has been discussed free virtualization is a much more elegant solution to this that trying to setup multiple OSes.

Instead of installing two distinct operating systems, virtualization allows you to run one OS from inside another in a "virtual computer". Then you can install whatever you want in the Windows XP Virtual Machine running on your Windows 7 computer.

If you're hardware can support it (most CPUs and Motherboards can nowadays) then setting this up in Windows 7 to run Windows XP is very easy.

There are, as has been mentioned, a variety of virtualization programs that allow you to do this. But, I think probably, Windows Virtual PC is the easiest to use and is entirely free.

Check out: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/virtual-pc/ . Where you can download the Beta and find out how to setup a Win XP virtual machine.

[iftiq]

Also of note- with Windows Virtual PC running on Windows 7, you don't need a seperate licence to install Windows XP as a virtual machine,

From Microsoft Website:

Does Windows XP come with Windows Virtual PC?

No. Windows XP Mode, a single virtual copy of Windows XP SP3, is available for download free of charge from http://www.microsoft.com/windows/vir...c/default.aspx for PCs running Windows 7 Professional, Windows 7 Ultimate and Windows 7 Enterprise.