Dual Booting?

[Runescapian321]

I'm a total noob at this so please don't laugh :p

These are my questions...

1) What exactly is dual booting? Like how does it work?
2) Can you do it on just about any computer or are there some sort of reqs?
3) Does this involve partitioning your drive?
4) Would you be able to access everything you have on one OS from the other OS?
5) Can this be done on a Vista computer? (dual boot would be XP)
6) What are the materials needed to do it? (like install disks, programs, etc)
7) When you load up one OS would it still take up the same resources as the other one? (Like say I dual booted with XP and my original is Vista, would my computer run basically as an XP computer?)
8) Could anyone give me a link on a tut on how to boot XP on a Vista computer?

Thanks :)

[infested999]

1) When you start you computer it asks which OS you want to use.
2) You need 2 partitions or 2 hard drives
3) Yes
4) Yes because it will be like 2 hard drives so with "my computer" you would see it
5) I have done this before, works good :D
6) 2 partitions, Install disks for both OS'es and a cd-rom drive.
7) Yes
8) http://apcmag.com/5485/dualbooting_vista_and_xp

[Runescapian321]

Install disks for both OSes? So it won't work if I don't have the vista one?

Sounds very good so far except for that part ^ :p

[KoKouKo]

you only need the disc for the os you want to install

example
my crap laptop came with vista and i want to install xp on it, i would only need the install disc for xp, i wouldnt need teh install disc for vista as i already have it installed

[infested999]

Yea well.... is you already have an OS installed you wont need the disk for that one. But if your starting out with a fresh new hard drive yo will need both.

Hmm i wonder what the max amount of OS'es are... ima try 20 at once...

[Runescapian321]

Ok, thanks. And one last question - Since you can access all of your files from the other OS, I'm assuming you don't need that big of a partition to hold everything on the extra OS? Around how big would it be?

EDIT: And probably not, but I'll ask anyway - could you install a MAC OS? :p

[Narcle]

Ok, thanks. And one last question - Since you can access all of your files from the other OS, I'm assuming you don't need that big of a partition to hold everything on the extra OS? Around how big would it be?

EDIT: And probably not, but I'll ask anyway - could you install a MAC OS? :p

You can install a MAC OS. Problem I found is accessing the files back and forth. You have to have a installed program to access the MAC files from the Windows OS and I'm not sure about the reverse (accessing windows files while running mac).

[Runescapian321]

OMG! You really can? So like all programs and stuff that would usually work with only MAC would work on it? Now, the question is, where can I get a MAC OS.... Is it possible to get it from the...erm...notsolegalwaywithtorrents? (not asking for a link or anything, just wondering if it'll work that way) :D (Then burning to a CD and using it as an install disk, etc)

[infested999]

Yup ill PM you the torrent.

[Narcle]

OMG! You really can? So like all programs and stuff that would usually work with only MAC would work on it? Now, the question is, where can I get a MAC OS.... Is it possible to get it from the...erm...notsolegalwaywithtorrents? (not asking for a link or anything, just wondering if it'll work that way) :D (Then burning to a CD and using it as an install disk, etc)

If the program is made for the MAC it will only work on the MAC. Only the files can be transfered back and forth. However there is some MAC emulators out there for windows to run MAC programs on windows, though I hardly see them as necessary. This also goes for the reverse, Windows on Windows unless you have a emulator.

[Runescapian321]

Oh, so something like when you download a program that works on Vista, XP, and then there's a seperate download for MAC. That wouldn't work on a MAC dual boot unless you use an emulator, which you could use on Windows anyway? Did I get that right?

If so then I'll probably just get XP and maybe try that Linux or Ubuntu tuff people like. Do the Linux and/or Ubuntu OS'es support Windows programs?

[Dan Cardin]

with linux, its extemely easy since its free :p.


and for mac, something like http://www.windowsdevcenter.com/pub/a/windows/2005/01/18/PearPC.html ??? all you need to do is torrent a working mac osx iso

EDIT: you can get windows programs on linux