Vista 32 and 64 bit dual boot
 

Hi, I have Vista 32 bit installed on my system and was wondering how do
I go about setting a dual boot with Vista 64 bit, so that I can choose
either OS at boot. I have a 500 gb hard drive and plan on using 100 or
more for the partition. Any ideas? Virtual machines are not an option!
Oh, and I do have two Vista licenses.


--
ElHombre86

Vista 32 and 64 bit dual boot
 

"ElHombre86" wrote in message
...

Hi, I have Vista 32 bit installed on my system and was wondering how do
I go about setting a dual boot with Vista 64 bit, so that I can choose
either OS at boot. I have a 500 gb hard drive and plan on using 100 or
more for the partition. Any ideas? Virtual machines are not an option!
Oh, and I do have two Vista licenses.

If you just have the one hard drive, with one large partition, assuming
you've got the space you can go into Disk Management (within Computer
Management in Administrative Tools), and right click on the particular hard
drive and select shrink volume.

The amount you can shrink depends on what sectors are where on the hard
drive, not all data can be moved, and even though you may have for example
200GB free on the drive, you may only be able to shrink the volume by say
100GB.

Once its finished shrinking the partition, (it may take some time) you can
create a new partition from Disk Management using the empty space.

Once that's done you can boot from the 64-bit disc, and install 64-bit into
the new partition.

--
Paul Smith,
Yeovil, UK.
Microsoft MVP Windows Desktop Experience.
http://www.dasmirnov.net/blog/
http://www.windowsresource.net/

*Remove nospam. to reply by e-mail*

Vista 32 and 64 bit dual boot
 

C: is primary partition for Vista 32 bit, 40GB + total RAM. D: can be
extended logical for Vista x64. 40GB + total RAM. Personally, I would
just do Vista x64 unless you have 16 bit apps.


--
SCSIraidGURU

Michael A. McKenney
'www.SCSIraidGURU.com' (http://www.SCSIraidGURU.com)

Vista 32 and 64 bit dual boot
 

Paul Smith;869918 Wrote:
"ElHombre86" wrote in message
...

Hi, I have Vista 32 bit installed on my system and was wondering how
do
I go about setting a dual boot with Vista 64 bit, so that I can
choose
either OS at boot. I have a 500 gb hard drive and plan on using 100
or
more for the partition. Any ideas? Virtual machines are not an
option!
Oh, and I do have two Vista licenses.

If you just have the one hard drive, with one large partition,
assuming
you've got the space you can go into Disk Management (within Computer
Management in Administrative Tools), and right click on the
particular hard
drive and select shrink volume.

The amount you can shrink depends on what sectors are where on the
hard
drive, not all data can be moved, and even though you may have for
example
200GB free on the drive, you may only be able to shrink the volume by
say
100GB.

Once its finished shrinking the partition, (it may take some time)
you can
create a new partition from Disk Management using the empty space.

Once that's done you can boot from the 64-bit disc, and install
64-bit into
the new partition.

--
Paul Smith,
Yeovil, UK.
Microsoft MVP Windows Desktop Experience.
'Paul Smith's Blog' (http://www.dasmirnov.net/blog/)
'The Windows Resource' (http://www.windowsresource.net/)

*Remove nospam. to reply by e-mail*

Thanks for the reply. By doing this, will I be given the choice of
either OS at boot? Also, will I loose any data by shrinking my hard
drive?


--
ElHombre86

Vista 32 and 64 bit dual boot
 

"ElHombre86" wrote in message
...

Thanks for the reply. By doing this, will I be given the choice of
either OS at boot?

Yes, when you install Windows Vista on the new partition, it will see the
other copy and setup a boot loader that let's you select which to boot at
start up.

Also, will I loose any data by shrinking my hard drive?

Nope.

--
Paul Smith,
Yeovil, UK.
Microsoft MVP Windows Desktop Experience.
http://www.dasmirnov.net/blog/
http://www.windowsresource.net/

*Remove nospam. to reply by e-mail*

Vista 32 and 64 bit dual boot
 

Thanks for the replies, I will try it out as soon as I can.


--
ElHombre86