Windows Xp And Windows 2000 Server - On same computer.

So, unfortunately, Microsoft thinks that you follow the Microsoft history, and you install the newest version over the older one.
So, if you install windows 2000 first, and then install windows XP, the Windows XP installer sees that there is an older version and does everything necessary in order to let you use the older or the newer.
So, now I would say that you have two problems :
1) first of all, do you know how to make a backup of your current Win XP installation ? If not, it's time to rush to try Ghost 10 and backup your XP system on CD or DVD.
2) If your XP installation uses your whole physical drive, you will have to shrink the C: disk into two smaller ones, one partition including the current XP install, and a second for receiving Win2k server install. If you don't know how to do this, you should rush and obtain Partition Magic or one of it's competitors.

Now comes the trick.
a) You install Win 2000 server. The installer will ask you where to install it, you choose the empty partition.
At this moment, at the end of the installation, you will have a single system able to boot, the Win 2k server.
If you know how to modify the boot.ini file, good luck, it should work. I would personally do something else :
Simply boot on your win XP CD. If you are lucky, you will be able to choose the "repair" installation, and the installer will repair the boot.ini file and create the dual-boot thing.
If not, reboot just in order to see that Win2k is still working, nothing has been destroyed, and boot on the XP CD and make a basic install. This is a 2-hours job, which will destroy your previous winXP install ; no problem because you have a backup (by the way, it would be a good idea to have previously tested your backup on another machine). At the end of the very basic Win XP install, you will have a dual-boot situation, where you will be able to boot from your new Win2k system or from your new winXP system.
c) Now comes the trick : restore your old WinXP backup on the partition where you previously had the new XP install. The old install with old your data will replace the new empy install.
d) Now, you have a brand new system, with a dual-boot with the new Win 2000 server operating system and your old Win XP system with it's date.

This a job I do very frequently. Every time I work carefully and do no mistake, I loose no data.
However, in case of mistake, especially during the backup, if you do mistakes, you may loose your data. So, what I would also suggest is put on a CD or on a network server all your personal files (your Word files, your Excel spreadsheets, your personal pictures and all the programs you wrote by yourself). So, in case of general catastrophy, you will be able to restart on a brand new machine with all our precious data on a DVD.
Hope this helped
Yordan

 

 

 

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You never did tell us why you wanted both XP and Server so I will go off on a tangent. Get a virtual machine application and run them both at the same time. You can run XP as your main OS and then run Windows Server 2000 inside XP when you need to. I have dual booted every combination that you can think of (XP, 2000, Linux, and every variation there of) and it is certainly possible but a virtual machine makes it so much easier. My primary need for multiple operating systems is software development and exploit analysis. If I develop an application in XP I can quickly start a 2000 virtual machine and make sure it also runs there.

In my opinion VMWare is the best but it is not free. Microsoft offers Virtual PC for free and it is OK for Microsoft only operating systems. If you want to run a web server (I assume this is why you want Server 2000) then this is a perfect solution. Run Windows 2000 in the virtual machine and then minimize and forget.

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