Dual Boot Windows 64 bit and Windows XP 32 Bit Scenario

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I held off for quite a bit on installing Windows XP Pro 32-bit on the other drive, but surprsingly, despite all the cautionary tales I've read, it was a non-event.

I have two drives, a big SATA 200G primary, and another ATA 60G I threw in there as a slave. Simply booted off the XP CD, chose the correct drive, installed XP, and it was fine. Contrary to what I had read, it DID NOT replace the NTLDR and related files on the primary partition with their 32-bit counterparts (Although I'd still recommend backing them up somewhere safe -- that's boot.ini, NTDetect, and NTLDR).

The only remaining task was to edit the boot.ini file on the primary to allow for the dual boot. Mine looks like so:

[boot loader]
timeout=5
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Windows Server 2003 Enterprise x64 Edition" /fastdetect /NoExecute=OptIn
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect

Note that the key number is rdisk(1) in the second OS line. Rdisk(0) is your primary drive, then rdisk(1), etc. That's all there is to it! I have a 5 second timeout set so if I do nothing when the list comes up, I get my desired default OS.

DISCLAIMER: No wild animals were injured in the creation of the UnBlog post. Your mileage may vary. Not responsible for... etc.
Peter has been active on the C# and other MS newsgroups, has had samples at gotdotnet.com (now codegallery.com) that have been downloaded over 56,000 times, and has written numerous articles for eggheadcafe.com, for which he is a co-founder, and MSDNAA sites. He has also been a technical reviewer on books from Prentice Hall, Manning and other publishers. Peter was a Microsoft MVP for 10 years. Peter was born and raised in New York City, and after a stint as a jazz musician playing contrabass with the Robert Hunt Trio, migrated to sunny Florida, where he was hired as a rookie Financial Consultant at Merrill Lynch in Orlando, specializing in Corporate Services. It was at Merrill that Peter realized computers and technology were his forte. He spent his last few years at Merrill developing real – time computerized trading and and stock charting program using advanced technical analysis indicators, some of which are his own inventions. In 1997, he moved on to architect and serve as lead developer on a number of innovative web-based and middleware solutions for the healthcare and financial services industry.

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