help with installing multiple OS

Hi all,

I'm currently fresh installing XP on my system and I'm considering making two separate XP installations on two separate partitions. I've been doing some reading on the topic and am weighing up the benefits, but I was hoping to get some thoughts and advice from real people out there.

Basically my thoughts are this: Making a dual boot system (both XP) on the one HDD. One partition would be used for the Internet, games, music, video, etc. In other words, all the day to day junk we like to do.

The other partition would be used primarily for video editing, so it would have Premiere Pro, some encoding software, music creation software, etc. This partition would not be connected to the net. The idea is that I can keep all my work apps separate from everything else and not need the internet, firewalls, adaware or a bunch of other stuff running in the background. It would also minimise conflicts between games, weird codecs and all that stuff that can (and has) cause(d) havoc with a video editing system.

Naturally I have separate HDD's dedicated to footage and backups.

So what are people’s thoughts? Pro's Vs con's and experiences. The main drawback I can see for me personally is having to restart my computer every time I want to check email or surf the net while editing. But this seems a small price to pay for a more stable system. I'm sure I could get used to it.

I look forward to any replies.
Cheers.
-Seal.

Well, in the interests of rounding off this thread, I decided to setup a dual boot system. Woo hoo.

you coudl also have used somethign like virtualPC to set up a ghost machine ( assuming your rig is up to it )

most of these background programs sit idle when they aren't working anyway, you wouldn't see much difference in frame rates with video encoding..
If you have a hardware router there forgoes the need for software filewalls.

However the mess with codecs is a good thing, so if it works then fair play.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by sealwatcher

The other partition would be used primarily for video editing, so it would have Premiere Pro, some encoding software, music creation software, etc. This partition would not be connected to the net. The idea is that I can keep all my work apps separate from everything else and not need the internet, firewalls, adaware or a bunch of other stuff running in the background. It would also minimise conflicts between games, weird codecs and all that stuff that can (and has) cause(d) havoc with a video editing system.

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You can also set up two different hardware profiles which may get you half way there. You can then tie in different services to different profiles. ie, you could set one up as 'video editing' and another as 'internet'. In the video editing profile you would disable you network card, switch off the firewall etc, the other you would leave them switched on. For the applications, you would need two seperate user accounts, and pray each program can be moved from the 'local machine' part of the registry to the 'current user' part. Codecs i'm not really 100% sure how they are installed, but think they would be for all profiles, ie in the 'local machine' part of the registry - you could experiment by moving things in the software section from HK_LM to HK_CU. If you're not entirely sure what i'm waffling on about - don't try it :D Or atleast make sure you have backups, which i'd recommend anyway, obviously :)

Benefit of doing things this way are erm, 1 OS - means more space for editing and you can update your OS when you have the internet enabled, negatives are its still one OS, so some of the reasons you mention for doing this may not be solved.

All in all, i've found Windows XP to be pretty good, but i don't use many different codecs so don't notice problems, and don't do a lot of video editing either.

Nox