Dual boot blues
Well, I finally decided to install Windows XP on my desktop, which is already running Vista. Within thinking, I just set up an extra partition and set it up. That was a lesson.
After WinXP finished and booted, I went into boot.ini and did like any other version of Windows. Yet when it booted, it hung up and failed. Shit, because I have all my data stored under Vista.
I finally got it back into booting into Vista (thanks to Startup Repair on the Vista disk), then realized that boot.ini doesn’t exist anymore for Vista, instead it uses Boot Configuration Data (BCD). Why?! The only way I to manually edit it is through the command prompt, so I had to learn how to do that. Arg, why can’t they just make it easier to use. Just because we are IT professionals doesn’t mean we ALWAYS want to do something the hard way!
I did find some softwares that would do the job, but man! I’m not paying money for something that is supposed to be simple. It’s crazy. I’ll get it done. In case you were wondering, VistaBootPro came highly recommended, and for those not too hardheaded enough to spend $10, looks like it is worth it. Me? I’ll google it till I learn it.
Well, we’ll find out later if I got it fixed. If not, I’ll just scrap XP, install it as a virtual machine, and enjoy the extra 250 gb of space.
