Question for Shane (or Quadzilla owners) re: 2 copies of XP on 2 separate drives

[GenerationM]

Good afternoon all:

This question is for Shane, Kris75 or any of the original Tyan Quad users. I am anxious to get PT8 installed under WinXP SP3, however, I'm not really crazy about losing the rock-solid stability of the PT 7.4cs8 install that I currently have. I am curious to know if it is possible to use my existing Acronis .tib image file of my latest full backup of my C:\ drive and use it to create an identical image on a newly purchased 80 GB drive. The new drive is identical to the one used when I first built my Quad. I'm quite computer-savvy, but the root concern comes from the fact that if I just use the image file to essentially clone my drive, XP may not detect that I've installed a second OS and not modify the boot.ini file properly.

The end result would be that, on bootup, I would be presented with the option to select between booting to the XP install with 7.4 on it, or booting to the XP install with 8.0 on it. (If this works out, I would uninstall 7.4 from the second drive and upgrade that install to run PT 8.0)

I'm sure this is possible, but I've never messed around that much with the boot loader before and don't want to halt production on the album I'm working on while I sort out the issues.

I'm hoping that someone has tried this or will have some insight into what I can do.

Regards,
Jeff

[albee1952]

That may work fine but this WILL work. Put your new drive in any external case, or inside the PC and open Acronis and go File>Clone Drive and follow thru the instructions so you actually clone your new drive from the old one. Then remove your old system drive and install the new clone in its place(or just move the cables if you can physically leave both drives in place). When you boot, you will be exactly where you were on the old drive. Then go ahead and put in your PT8 disk and use its uninstaller utility to remove the 7.4 install(it will not remove any 3rd party plugins), reboot and run the installer and start testing. This is how I did the same routine and I can swap back and forth between the old 7.4 setup and the new PT8 setup as my rackmount case has the drives installed with the connectors at the top so I just lift the lid and move the IDE and power cables between the 2 drives. FWIW, I have had no issues opening sessions from either version of PT, in the other version.

[GenerationM]

Hey albee:

Actually that solution is what my computer tech recommended, as he is more of a Linux guy and is unfamiliar with the WinXP boot loader as it pertains to this case. I would still like to be able to keep both drives in the system without the worry of swapping cables, however if it's going to be more hassle than it's worth, I may just have to do that. And, yes, I had forgotten about the 'clone drive' option in Acronis.

Question, did you leave your power connected to both drives and just swap the data cable?

Thanks for the quick reply...

Regards,
Jeff

[mykhal c]

Originally Posted by GenerationM

Hey albee:

Actually that solution is what my computer tech recommended, as he is more of a Linux guy and is unfamiliar with the WinXP boot loader as it pertains to this case. I would still like to be able to keep both drives in the system without the worry of swapping cables, however if it's going to be more hassle than it's worth, I may just have to do that. And, yes, I had forgotten about the 'clone drive' option in Acronis.

Question, did you leave your power connected to both drives and just swap the data cable?

Thanks for the quick reply...

Regards,
Jeff

both ways will/do work. i've got clones of all my main drives. but havin' to open my case and move cables everytime would be 'my' second choice. as worst, if you did have to edit your boot.ini file, your mod would be as simple as dup'n the startup line and changin' "partition(1)" to "partition(2)"....simple reboot then make your choice. now if you were runnin' VISTA then the dual boot XP/VISTA thing presents other challenges. but dual XP...easy

EDIT: i think i misunderstood your first post. seems like you weren't talkin' about dual partitions on the same physical drive anyway, that'd be my choice...still

[albee1952]

Since you have to reboot anyway, I move both the power AND ide cables(but on my setup, its easy. Other cases can be a different story). I have never been a fan of dual boot(just my preference) and feel more comfortable having a complete spare drive ready to go(actually, I have a spare clone of the 7.4 drive on a shelf too). If you use SATA drives, I highly recommend one of these
http://www.datoptic.com/cgi-bin/web....115&detail=yes
or these
http://cgi.ebay.com/KINGWIN-KF-3000-...3A1|240%3A1318
as these make swapping drives really simple(but I do not recommend hot-swapping despite the claim that it works because it is not as dependable as one would like). Of course you cannot hot-swap the system drive anyway.

[mykhal c]

it's kinda like havin' 2 remotes for 2 devices as opposed a universal remote for both!! just messin' with ya!! we all got our prefs!!!

[danander11]

Couldn't you just have each installation on separate drives, then use F8 when your computer boots and tell it which drive to use.. Both stay connected and all the work is just a few keystrokes at your keyboard... no wires, cables, gremblins, etc...

Peace!

[Shan]

I've moved my Images around to different partitions and drives in the past. My images even include different Operating Systems with different versions of PT etc. Everyone has offered some great tips above.

Definitely have a multi boot system so you can get back into your 7.4 partition quickly...you'll be doing that more than once.

Shane

[Mark Seyler]

I have been running 2 bootable versions of XP3 Home for about a year now, under Acronis Disk Director and with high levels of satisfaction. I use it to keep the PTools OS away from the internet, the other OS being general, non-audio work with internet, office programs etc on it. I would be very uncomfortable moving cables around all the time... this seems a good software solution and isn't expensive for what you get (drive partitioning etc etc)...... PC boots to a screen which asks which partition / drive version of the OS you want next, or reverts to a default after a variable pause. Easy and seems reliable (I really should not have said that.......)
I use Acronis True image fo back-ups too.... not too sure about this though as the program does seem to do a few things I don't like and is probably over-complicated for a non-PC-nerd like me.....

[weezul]

another +1 for bypassing any bootloader and using the f12 for start up device choice or whatever your shortcut may be..