I have an HP that I bought six months ago with XP Home.  It's 1.3 Ghz,
384 Mb RAM, and 60 GB Hard Drive.  I want it setup a dual boot.  I want
either 98SE or ME.  Preferably 98SE because ME is so buggy.  Is this
possible with XP?

Thanks,
James

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Clarification of Question by james193-ga on 14 Jun 2002 03:11 PDT

OK, Let me just get this straight.  If I want to install 98, I would
have to create a disk partition in Fat32 and install it in that
partition?

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Clarification of Question by james193-ga on 14 Jun 2002 03:14 PDT

Richard, I don't really have much on the hard drive.  It came with XP
installed on a partition that I can't touch.  It didn't come with any
xp installation disks, so that partition would have to stay intact. 
It also came with the partition that it has all of my personal files
on.

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Clarification of Question by james193-ga on 14 Jun 2002 04:05 PDT

The whole not having XP cd thing really sucks.  I know Microsoft is
trying to stop piracy and such, but if they force you to activate the
product, what harm is giving the buyer a disk?  I think I can get a
disk from HP in case I completely destroy the hard drive.  But it will
likely take weeks to arrive after hours on hold paying for tech
support.

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Clarification of Question by james193-ga on 14 Jun 2002 05:11 PDT

Good suggestion about Linux.  I'll have to check into that.  Linux has
always intrigued me, but I've never tried it.  Thanks for the offer
Deano, but I don't think you can give me Pro legally.

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Clarification of Question by james193-ga on 14 Jun 2002 20:14 PDT

Lindows sounds good, but I'm trying not to spend money on this
project.  I have 95, 98, 98SE, ME, & 2000 on disk from previous
computers, so I don't have a problem installing them.  Those linux
versions that fastpenguin recommended are free which is good.  A
friend of mine has PartitionMagic already, so I'll borrow his disk. 
I'll let you know how it's going soon.

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Clarification of Question by james193-ga on 14 Jun 2002 22:01 PDT

I installed Mandrake Linux and I can easily switch back and forth
between it and XP.  The only problem is that my screen flickers when
I'm in linux, but not in XP.  Any suggestions?

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Clarification of Question by james193-ga on 14 Jun 2002 23:09 PDT

I think I want to remove Mandrake.  How do I go about doing this?  Do
I just remove the partition?

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Clarification of Question by james193-ga on 16 Jun 2002 03:39 PDT

How do I remove the Mandrake and get it back to just XP?

Hi James,

There is a very simple method to this which I will provide to you for
free but in order to apply the method you will need to back up all the
data you currently have on the disk, is this possible?

Richard

It is possible to add Windows ME or 98SE on the same machine in
different drives, partitioned drive, or same drive as fully functional
OS.

Hi James,

PLease visit the following link that will help you to set up your
system to dual boot between Windows XP and Windows 98.

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;q306559

Goodluck..
Regards,
JK

Go to http://www.dougknox.com/ then search the site for 'XP dual boot'
All your answers should be there. It actually looks like a fairly
standard bual boot set up, the only signifigant difference is the
repairing of the XP boot loader.
Good Luck!!

James,
RE the Fat32 question....
If XP is installed on a NTFS partion, with W98 installed on FAT32 it
will probably fail to dual boot. I find it interesting that you state
that you have no XP install disks..
This possibly could make life interesting. I still however suggest you
check the link I provided earlier http://www.dougknox.com/ and look
under XP Fixes, and you will see the article on W98 / XP dual boot set
up.

Windows ME is buggy. Solution: use Linux, I would suggest you, the
followng Linux distributions:
MandrakeLinux: http://www.mandrakelinux.com/ 
SuSE Linux: http://www.suse.com/

Both these distributions, and many others, have powerfull and
graphical, tools to setup dual boots.

As Deano stated, it is perfectly legal to use any Windows XP CD-ROM
for the installation, as long as you own (and can produce on request)
a license for each installation of the software.

Oh, I just relised you have XP Home....mine is XP Pro. Which I think
isn't allowed......sorry mate.

Another solution to look into is to just ditch XP and replace it with
Lindows, a new Linux OS that will have built-in support for Windows
application. It can install in your Windows partition already and
provide dual-boot status (meaning you don't have to re-partition your
hard drive for it), or you can replace Windows XP entirely. The look &
feel is that of Win98SE or Windows 2000. Currently it is still in
beta, and it is still buggy - a few Windows applications from
Microsoft don't run as pleasently as they should. These issues should
be cleared up before it goes 1.0, though. If you're really interested,
you can purchase the Preview Edition for $99, and have access to all
upgrades including 1.0 when it is released. I am *VERY* seriously
considering replacing my Win98SE installation with this.

See http://www.lindows.com/ for more information.

Hello James!

With a hard drive as large as yours, you could probably install a
myriad of other operating systems.

Dual booting is common practice and is certainly possible in your
case. I would also recommend  Windows 98SE over ME if you want more
stability. 0

Seeing that you can't really touch that partition, I only have one
suggestion for you. You will need to repartition the drive though, and
do note that this procedure isn't fail-safe. Installing Windows 98
over Windows XP will probably work as well, but in the long run it's
mixing apples and oranges and I certainly would not recommend it.

NOTE: MAKE SURE TO BACK UP ALL IMPORTANT DATA BEFORE PROCEEDING!

Step 1: Repartition your hard disk

Each operating system must be installed on a separate logical drive.
What this means is that you may  have one large hard drive, but it
will be divided into sub-drives, called logical drives. In effect, 
you'll be seeing something like drive C: and D: on one drive.

The best tool for that IMHO is PowerQuest's Partition Magic available
at: www.powerquest.com/partitionmagic/

Use it to split your drive into two drives. Partition Magic had done
this flawlessly in my experience and I haven't lost any data.

Step 2: Create Windows XP startup disks

Check out http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/release.asp?releaseid=33290
and follow instructions for downloading and creating the boot disks.

NOTE: CHECK THAT THESE BOOT DISKS WORK BEFORE CONTINUING!

Step 3:  Install Windows 98 on your D: drive

The installation of Windows 98 may, and probably will change the boot
sector of the C: drive. This will prevent you from booting Windows XP.

Step 4: Booting XP again

Reboot with the XP startup disks and fix the installation. You'll have
an option of doing that. That will fix the boot sector and let you
boot to both operating systems, at least in theory.

Due to the fact that you don't have a Windows XP CD and partition
restraints that's about the only advice I can give you. I don't want
to sound too scary, but do this at your own risk. In the worst case
you'll be stuck with Windows 98.

Regards,

Pawel

Following on from using Powerquest Partition Magic, this is the best
way to go!

You should also use a utility called Boot Magic, this will sort out
any booting problems.

With XP installed and no CD media, get hold of a copy of partition
magic pro and resize your current XP partition to a size of your
choice, 30/40gig sounds about right.

Then add another primary partition, (FAT32). You should be able to
format it from within Partition Magic aswell. As far as I know, you
cannot boot from a logical drive, but I may be wrong!

Stick in a Windows 98 startup disk, from http://www.bootdisk.com and
boot into dos.

Find your newly partitioned drive and install windows 98 on it.

When that is completed you will be able to boot into 98, but no XP.

Get hold of Boot Magic and you can use this tool to setup a boot
loader to either boot into 98 / XP or DOS.

Fairly easy and straight forward, you just need to find the software
mentioned above. You maybe able to get it as a 30 day download.

Damo.

Try www.vmware.com

Their product called Workstation allows you to install multiple OSs in
Win XP.  You can install Windows XP, Windows 2000, Windows NT 4.0,
Windows Me, Windows 98, Windows 95, Windows 3.1, MS-DOS 6, Linux, and
FreeBSD.

Read more here:

http://www.vmware.com/products/desktop/ws_features.html