license question for a dual-boot (Vista/XP) setup

[Paul Kraemer]

Hi,

My PC has a dual-boot setup that allows me to run either Windows XP or
Windows Vista. I currently have OneNote 2007 installed only on the Vista
installation.

Can anyone tell me if the license allows me to install OneNote 2007 on the
XP installation as well?

Thanks in advance,
Paul

 

[Rainald Taesler]

My PC has a dual-boot setup that allows me to run either Windows XP
or Windows Vista. I currently have OneNote 2007 installed only on
the Vista installation.

Although this might seem to be off-topic:
Which kind of Boot-Manager do you use?

Dual boot with XP and Vista is a really dangerous thing unless one is
using a boot-manger which is able to completely *HIDE* the
drive/partition with Vista so that XP can not see it.

Otherwise on each start XP will kill/overwrite the breakpoints (restore
points).
Therefore neither system restore nor using shadowcopies will work in
Vista thereafter.
And as system restore and shadocopies are among the top important new
features of Vista.

So it's my urgent advice to either use a professional bootmanager which
hides the system partitions from each other ort just give up XP.

I also started with the simple dual-boot because I was not sure how
Vista would work.
But I gave it up.
And me thinks that having XP in addition was really unnecessary. I did
not yet come across any of my software which would not work under Vista.
A few glitches with some applications from the Win 3.x days but not
worth fumbling around with 2 OSs.

Just my 2 cents.

Rainald

 

[Michael]

OneNote 2007 allows for 2 installations as long as they are not running
concurrently, which in the case of dual booting would not be an issue. I
have a dual boot as well with OneNote 2007 on each partition.

Michael

 

[Rainald Taesler]

I am using V-COM System Commander for the dual-boot. I just set it
up over the weekend on my notebook PC, which I bought with Vista
pre-installed.

Sorry, I do not know that software.
So do not know how it works.
AFAICS Acronis "Disk Directory has the functionality to hide the XP
partition.

I had hoped that I could get by with just Vista,
but there are a few apps I depend on that still do not work with
Vista.

Which ones do not work under Vista the way they should?
So far I did not yet put Vista on my TabletPC but on my desktop so far I
did not have troubles.

So far, it seems to be working well.
I installed system commander on the Vista partition, and then used
it to create a new partition for XP. I installed XP and System
Commander said something about hiding the Vista partition for the
first reboot after the XP installation. After that, I can boot to
either OS. From Windows XP, I am able to see the Vista partition
as drive D: and I am able to read/write files to it. Conversely,
from Vista, I am able to see the XP partition as drive D: and
read/write files to it.

AFAICS this way your System system is not protected as needed.
The Vista system partition has to be completely hidden from XP. This
does not apply to a partition where the data are stored. This one can be
used by OSs.

So far this seems to be working very well.

Carefully watch the situation.
Try to roll back the Vista system to earlier restore points.
And try if restoring a previous version of a directory (folder).

I don't mind giving up
the system restore points if I have to. I use Acronis TrueImage to
create an image of my entire drive before making changes to my
system so I can go back in time if things don't work out.

I have Acronis too. But this IMO is not sufficient. One would not create
images daily. And it's the small things which may cerate problems and
installs gone wrong. System restore is by far improved in Vista and the
shadow copies are most useful.

My fingers are crossed, but hopefully this works out. The only
alternative right now is to carry two laptops with me every time I
travel!

How about a less painful alternative?
AFAIK Acronis Disk Director comes with the necessary instruments for
hiding partitions and safeguarding the Vista system by this.

Rainald

 

[Paul Kraemer]

Hi Rainald,

The apps that lack support for Vista are Rockwell Software RS Logix 5000, RS
Logix 500, and RS Logix 5. These are programming software for Allen-Bradley
programmable logic controllers, which I use to control the machines my
company builds. To be honest, I didn't even attempt to install them under
Vista. Maybe they would have worked, but I couldn't find anyone who had
attempted it before, and I knew if I ran into trouble, I would not get any
support from Rockwell because they clearly state that Vista is not supported.
I figured going with the dual-boot setup was my best bet.

Right now, my current setup does everything I need to get through the next
two projects I have coming up in the next few months. I will keep a close
eye on it and make sure I am diligent in cloning my drive frequently with
Acronis TrueImage so that I can go back in time should I run into problems.
For now, I think I will avoid using the Windows system restore and shadow
copy features on this system because it took me a while to get it setup this
way and I don't want to tempt fate.

I will read up on System Commander and if there is any information as to how
or if it handles the problem you mentioned with having Vista and Xp on the
same system. I will try it out (on a test system) to see if it has problems
with System Restore and shadow copy. I will also try out Acronis Disk
Director when I get a chance (probably on another computer at first) to see
whether I think it is either better or safer. When I get around to this, I
will let you know my results.

I appreciate your input. Thank you.

Paul

 

[Rainald Taesler]

Thanks for your reply, Paul.
What you have is some very special software and it could pretty well be
that it's not compatible.
However, depending on the time needed for testing, it might be worth the
time to just try it out on another machine.
Have made an image and working with system restore will safeguard the
system.
Using the latter I had no problem with trying out the older versions on
Norton AV and Nero known to be most cruel beast.
The only real damage which happened to me was with the indexing engine
(Windows Search) and this only because there was no restore point old
enough.

As you say that you will avoid to work with Windows system restore and
shadow copy features:
You are missing quite something. The new techniques work reliably. And
they don not change user data files. If one goes back step-by-step for
curing a problem - having a recent image - it's really safe. So
everything I install I set a restore point (breakpoint) and if the
result is not as it should be I just start a rollback.
And restoring a previous version of directory is of help if one one has
deleted, overwritten or moved something.

Although the dual-boot subject is at least a bit off-topic in here, it
would be really nice if you could give some feedback on the results of
your testing.

From the discussions in the MS Vista newsgroups I know that quite many
folks began with XP/Vista dual-boot not knowing of the most dangerous
behaviour of XP. And only too many have seriously been bitten.
I really can not understand that MS does not have created built-in alarm
bells ...

All the best
Rainald