single sata drive install xp first and then vista but have to change bios

[topcattroy]

Hello all, i've been working on this for a long time reading.

So here is my problem.
I used kill disk to erase my sata drive. I then installed xp pro, but in order to do this i had to change my bios from ahci to ide.
Xp installed and boots great.
Then i installed vista on the same drive but different partiontion.
I had to go into bios and change back from ide to ahci in order for it to install.
Now it comes up as a duel boot system but when i try to boot up xp it does the error to protect my system.
The only way i can get xp to boot is to load into my bios and change back from ahci, to ide, then xp will boot.
When i do this i can't get vista to boot. I have to change back in bois from ide to ahci for vista and vise versa.
This is driving me crazy.
Is there something im missing , ive even use vista boot loader but can't get that to work. Ive tried every combination.
Can someone please help. Theres got to be a way to just select the operating system and boot without going into bios.
THanks to all who help

[Shades]

This is the first time I hear that you had to make adjustments in the BIOS to install XP.

And it doesn't sound any good, I might add. One thing you should do is finding out exactly what kind of hardware is in your  PC/laptop? I mean model and type numbers by that. With a bit of googling you will quickly find out if there are any solutions available. Search on the vendor sites first and if that is not sufficient, then look on those "backwater forums" for possible hacks. 

From personal experience I do know is that it is practically impossible to install XP on a certain (recent) model of ACER laptops, which are solely intended for Vista. There is no support from ACER or from the individual hardware components itself for XP. Very likely this is also the case in your PC.

What I also know from my years as "that PC-guy" is that dual-booting two different Windows versions is a gimmick from which the novelty wears off (very) quickly. Let's just say that if this kind of setup last more than one month I am impressed. You would be amazed how fast one thinks that this old stuff (XP) takes a lot of space on the hard disk that could have been used for something more useful like games, music, pr0n and that it is all more fun in the new "toy" (Vista).

In short: don't bother, it is not worth the trouble. Dual-booting two completely different Operating Systems does make sense. Mixing two lines from the same family is never a good idea (which is also true in real life as well, I might add ).

[f0dder]

Find chipset/sata drivers for your hardware and integrate those drivers with your XP install CD - then set bios to AHCI and reinstall XP.

Alternatively, just dump XP and get used to Vista

[bgd77]

I had a similar problem with my Acer laptop.

It is a little complicate to enable AHCI after you installed XP. Unfortunately I did not note down the steps I followed. From what I remember this site has been helpful:

http://forums.pcper.com/showthread.php?t=444831

Try to search the internet on how to enable AHCI on XP (after installing XP) for your particular laptop model.

[topcattroy]

THanks for all the help to everyone. I have Medion desktop pc. I bought at Aldi's , yes the grocery store. It is a 2.1 ghz processor, triple core. But it doesn't have
a floppy drive to install the sata drivers when asked with f6 key.
It came with vista, i erased hard drive then intalled xp then vista. Like i said i can boot both but i have to go into bios everytime. I would just like to
be able to select the operating system i want and go.
thanks again to all that posted back.

[f0dder]

topcattroy: ALDI has some OK offers every now and then... I wouldn't buy myself, but it's usually decent stuff when you take the price into account.

No, you can't use the F6 without a floppy drive, but using nLite (or a bunch of manual work), you can integrate the drivers (and service packs and hotfixes and tweaks and...) with the normal Windows XP install CD and burn your own copy, and that should fix the problem. And you can make the install unattended, that rocks a lot

[topcattroy]

here is my dxdiag info
gona try the reg fix

System Information
------------------
Time of this report: 2/12/2009, 08:37:51
      Machine name: TROY-PC
  Operating System: Windows Vista™ Home Premium (6.0, Build 6001) Service Pack 1 (6001.vistasp1_gdr.080917-1612)
          Language: English (Regional Setting: English)
System Manufacturer: MEDIONPC
      System Model: MS-7501
              BIOS: Default System BIOS
         Processor: AMD Phenom(tm) 8450 Triple-Core Processor (3 CPUs), ~2.1GHz
            Memory: 2814MB RAM
         Page File: 747MB used, 5090MB available
       Windows Dir: C:\Windows
   DirectX Version: DirectX 10
DX Setup Parameters: Not found
    DxDiag Version: 6.00.6001.18000 32bit Unicode


thanks f0dder for the quick response ill try nlite to

[topcattroy]

Hey f0dder does this mean i would have to reinstall everything. and can i make the cd in vista to burn and then install.
I mean to say use nlite in vista with my xp install cd and then burn all of it with the fixes to a new xp install cd.
thanks

[bgd77]

Be careful when editing the registry. It is very possible that you will have to change the configuration file, taking in consideration the motherboard/chipset with which your computer came.

I see that you have an AMD processor, so the reg hack probably won't work as it is described on that page, as it refers to Intel chipsets.

Better do what f0dder suggested, or search the internet on how to do it for your motherboard.

[topcattroy]

tried to use nlite but after it read my install cd it comes up with error .net framework and closes the program.
I am doing with vista running and not xp.
Gonna try that

[Carol Haynes]

Hey f0dder does this mean i would have to reinstall everything. and can i make the cd in vista to burn and then install.
I mean to say use nlite in vista with my xp install cd and then burn all of it with the fixes to a new xp install cd.
thanks

Yes to those for XP - I had to use nLite to create an installation disc with the required SATA drivers to get Windows XP to install. You shouldn't need to do this for Vista (and if you do you should use vLite)

You could probably do a repair install of Windows XP from the nLited CD but you would then probably need to fix the Vista installation too as XP's installer will overwrite the boot sector.

I am not sure how you do that in Vista but in XP you run the recovery console and type FIXBOOT at the command prompt. There must be something similar in Vista.

[topcattroy]

ok i finally when and bought a floppy drive tried to install the drivers using F6 key and that didn't work. So now i have a second hard drive
i installed and im gonna install xp on one and vista on the other. Just wondering if i need to set bios to raid. to install or just after i install
both operating systems.

[topcattroy]

oh by the way i used nlite and it does the same thing. i have to change bios to boot between them
seem the drivers that came with the computer don't work, and the drivers i downloaded from medion don't work either.
So thats why i finally said im done.
Going with the two hard drives installing on both different operating systems

[Carol Haynes]

You don't want to enable RAID - if you do the two drives will probably appear as one!

They should just be listed as two separate drives.

Having said that if they are connected to the same SATA interface I would guess you might have the same problems trying to install XP on that drive!

[topcattroy]

thanks everyone, FINALLY got it to work, what i did was used kill disk for both my hard drives.
Then i installed xp on the new hard drive i installed. Then i installed vista on the defalt hard drive that came with the computer.
Here the thing though i installed the new drive into the ide port of my mother board.
So after that i was able to set bios to ahci and not ide. Don't know how this actually worked but it set
that drive to primary.
I still don't have the choice for which operating system to use. But i start my computer and hit the F8 key to go to boot menu
Here is were my drives come up. Then i select the xp drive. If i just hit power on button and not F8 key it boots into vista.
I did however had to install my audio card drivers which is what i found was the entire problem, go figure.
After that the two drives come up as drive c: under what ever system i booted to.
So if im using the xp drive the letter for that is c and vista is g
If im in vista the system drive is c and xp is I .
Not sure how all this managed to work , because i spent 10 hours to get it to work and installed operating system like over and over.
If anyone else has this problem post here and ill try and help.
My computer is a medion triple core from aldi's grocery store.
It did come with drivers for xp even thought it was installed with vista.
Hope this helps.
thanks again to all.
troy

[f0dder]

topcattroy: AHCI is only relevant for SATA drives, which is why your new setup works with XP on the IDE drive - if you had integrated chipset drivers with nLite, you'd be able to install XP to the sata drive in AHCI mode.

[topcattroy]

fodder: i did try and intagrate it but for some reason it just came up blue screen error.
I might try it again next weekend. It seemed to be an audio driver that was messing it up.