Dual booting Vista and DOS

[php111]

Hi,

For some reason everyone tells me on different forums that Vista can for sure be on a different drive then C. My opion no it can't. I just tried putting Vista on a different partition and it still took over the C drive. Why is that? XP was never like that. Now Vista took over and forced DOS onto another drive. How can i keep DOS on C? Do i also need a Vista boot loader?

[patio]

XP did in fact do this...every OS Windows wrote to my knowledge has always written certain files to the root of C: no matter which drive/partition you decide to install it on...
To do what you want you would need to create a FAT partition and make it active...it wouldn't need to be that large unless you have a ton of DOS games you need to install.
Then create your other partitions as needed with one being both large enough for Vista but also formatted NTFS.
Install DOS in the first active partition which will be C:
Then put the Vista CD in and re-boot to the setup ...choose the appropiate partition to install Vista to and you should be good to go....

After finishing the complete process you will now have a boot menu that asks which OS you want to boot to...no third party programs needed at all.

What you may see with Vista is if you boot to it it will report Vista as being on C:...this is normal. It is simply ignoring the MSDOS install at boot time.

[contrex]

Patio, what you wrote is exactly right. Crucial to get DOS installed properly and bootable FIRST.

[php111]

Before i actually made this topic. I did exactly that and i choose the partition for Vista and it put it on drive C anyway.

[soybean]

After finishing the complete process you will now have a boot menu that asks which OS you want to boot to...no third party programs needed at all.

php111, do you not have this option appear during startup?

[php111]

After finishing the complete process you will now have a boot menu that asks which OS you want to boot to...no third party programs needed at all.

php111, do you not have this option appear during startup?

No i did not got that message.

[patio]

Before i actually made this topic. I did exactly that and i choose the partition for Vista and it put it on drive C anyway.

Not sure why this didn't work correctly for you.
What did you use to create your partitions ? ?

One program that i've seen recommended quite a few times is
VistaBoot Pro

Not sure if it will work after the fact so be sure to read the documentation first...

[programming_pat]

Vista is very specific about where it wants to put its files and doesnt stop until it gets what it wants. Is there any particular reason why you want dos?

[php111]

Before i actually made this topic. I did exactly that and i choose the partition for Vista and it put it on drive C anyway.

Not sure why this didn't work correctly for you.
What did you use to create your partitions ? ?

One program that i've seen recommended quite a few times is
VistaBoot Pro

Not sure if it will work after the fact so be sure to read the documentation first...

I used Paragon Disk Manager from Hiren's Boot CD to partition my drive. Is there a way around this by stopping Vista to be on C?

[patio]

Since it seems to be getting confusing let me explain further...

DOS needs to be on C: ...this is not negotiable.
It needs to be a FAT partition and set as active.
DOS needs to be completely installed including all drivers and booted a few times to make sure everything is operating properly.
Vista can then be installed.
Vista can be installed to any other partition.
Vista however will still write some neccessary files to the root folder of C:...this is also not negotiable.

After both are installed DOS will reside on C: with Vista on D: for example...
However when booting to Vista it may report itself as on C:...again this is normal as Vista is ignoring the DOS partition at boot time.

The best way to not let this get too confusing would be to give your partitions a volume label so you know what's going where...this can be done with Partition Manager.

If done properly at each boot you will be shown 2 boot choices...DOS or Vista.

If this doesn't work for you then use VistaBoot Pro to set it all up...

[php111]

Since it seems to be getting confusing let me explain further...

DOS needs to be on C: ...this is not negotiable.
It needs to be a FAT partition and set as active.
DOS needs to be completely installed including all drivers and booted a few times to make sure everything is operating properly.
Vista can then be installed.
Vista can be installed to any other partition.
Vista however will still write some neccessary files to the root folder of C:...this is also not negotiable.

After both are installed DOS will reside on C: with Vista on D: for example...
However when booting to Vista it may report itself as on C:...again this is normal as Vista is ignoring the DOS partition at boot time.

The best way to not let this get too confusing would be to give your partitions a volume label so you know what's going where...this can be done with Partition Manager.

If done properly at each boot you will be shown 2 boot choices...DOS or Vista.

If this doesn't work for you then use VistaBoot Pro to set it all up...

I am going to need VistaBoot Pro. Where can i download it from? Is it freeware? How do i set it up and configure it?

[programming_pat]

Have you changed the bootup options for dual boot in the system properties dialog box in the control panel?

[php111]

Have you changed the bootup options for dual boot in the system properties dialog box in the control panel?

No. How do i do that?

[programming_pat]

Under system in Control Panel. Juts look for boot up

[php111]

Under system in Control Panel. Juts look for boot up

I don't see anything like that. I tell you what i do see on the left.

Device Manager
Remote settings
System protection
Advanced system settings