Vista - Dual boot Vista and XP on Vista Preinstalled?

Hi,

I read the article on Vista and XP dual boot with Vista installed first. But I've vista preinstalled on my laptop it means there are no Vista installation CD's seperate. In the article it is mentioned that they are using DISKPART from Vista CD. Is it possible to use dual boot on preinstalled pc's?
Rgs,

Sree

how come you didn't get a installation cd with your pre-install? what do you do if you have to reformat your computer?

theyre shipping the disks on pc's themselves nower days, supposedly a green thing.

If you have the vista key on top of your pc then dont worry, you can install a dodgy copy of vista and microsoft provide a tool that you can change the key with... if the key matches your hardware config then it will allow you to change it, it also eliminates the need for activation so ive been told...

as foor dual booting, it is possible, but you may need some 3rd party tools to minimize your original partition and then create a new one with XP's setup media.

I've read that it's easier to install XP first, then Vista as a dual-boot. You have to make sure both partitions are primary partitions and not extended partitions.

i agree drumz, the vista boot loader looks for previous versions and takes them them incorporates them into its own... so ive read

You can repartition from within Vista...

I've no cd's supplied with pc instead I took backup of the system with preinstalled system with accompanying software that sony provides. I dont know what to do. Vista seems to be taken almost 50% of my 2 Gb Ram. I like to work in Vista with XP. If it is allowing me to do dual boot as mentioned in one of the thread, I'd be happy.

Best Regrads,

Sree

Yes, I can see the product key and there is an option to change the product key. But someone have to tell me, how can I use my backup cd's of preinstalled software to make a dual boot with Vista? Is it possible or not?

Best Regards,

Sree

not possible, not with backup cd's, but that wasnt what you asked.

If my memory serves me right I believe XP's NTLDR will dual boot Vista if it is installed after Vista.

I didn't like the two systems served by one boot loader so I use a third party boot loader from a Linux to triple boot.

Basically I hide the Vista partition to install XP. Once I had both XP and Vista installed I just hide one, unhide the other MS system in the booting.

I wrote this thread to explain it.

The hiding and unhiding can be instructed using Grub. It is quite simple and I have done it with 3 versions of Dos plus 5 versions of Windows before in one box.