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A "box" bought from "PC World" that's a Compaq with no markings whatsoever - very odd!!! Does it actually SAY "Compaq on the Tower? If so there SHOULD be a Sticker on the Back telling the Specific Model and what's called a BOM-ID (Bill OF Material), along with a Serial Number. I have NEVER seen an HP/Compaq that didn't have this (and have 5 of them sitting here next to me)!!! Now, as for the "Drivers", Vista was/is infamous for NOT having all of the drivers on the "Install CD" so don't bet on it! There's no such thing as a ("useful") "activation key,product id and pid number". There exists one thing and one thing only - a Product Key (xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx) both the OEM "Internal" one and the one specifically on the COA (a sticker either ON THE PC or IN THE DVD SLEEVE). Anything else is BOGUS! Finally, barring anything else INSIDE the Tower is a MotherBoard that WILL have a stamp on it saying exactly WHAT it is. These MoBos are OEM-specific and if that PC as as new as you claim (core 2 duo) then there MUST be some specific documentation on the HP website. Again, anything else is BOGUS and you may have been HAD! the model no is SR5601UK I HAD ANOTHER LOOK AND IT SAYS COMPAQ. it is indented into case.but has hp software in recovery partition and in c drive too. a microsoft sticker with barcode at the side gives a product key which is different to the one i got from the vista hive using product key finder. why is this? why is it different? which one would i use? also i found inside the HP folder a driver collection which i copied onto the xp hard drive for safekeeping. so this means that i can borrow a vista cd or download it then put in the the product key from the side of the case and i will be ok as i have the drivers also ? ok? also it will not be illegal since i bought the product. am i correct?

it is a intel celeron duo core compaq computer but has various HP software preinstalled on it . no model number anywhere.seems run of the mill.bought from pc world. home vista premium. i have the activation key,product id and pid number now. surely i could delete the existing vista which is virtually useless as even the simplest task takes forever and install vista home premium either from a friends cd or even download it but as i have paid for it already and using the existing vista activation key it should work ans i would be above board. the recovery partition you say has drivers but surely vista cd come with generic drivers anyway.

"The whole point of my previous post is that INSTEAD of "copying partitions resizing them", you rather CREATE new partitions (of changed size) then copy FILES to them. jaclaz " but that is what i intend to do.the new hard drive will have 4 primary partitions just bIg enough to hold all the files and a few gigs extra. you are saying restore MBR will not work? what about fixmbr? or what if i install FRESH windows me to partition c: on new hard drive then delete all the files then copy/paste the old windows me from old hard drive.surely that will work/boot because i have done it before and it works. only question is will xp1 ,xp2,xp3 work on the partitions :e: f: using the boot.ini file on c: on new hard drive.

i have a another idea. if i can recover the product key and activation key from my existing home vista by using software like joshua product key then could i not borrow somebody else home vista installation cd and install from that and then use the recovered activation key from MY home vista? remember i purchased this already but the pc maker did not supply me with vista install discs.

But can Acronis True Image clone from a larger hard drive to a smaller hard drive? Also to Jaclaz after reading your post is it possible that using a MBR backup utility on the original hard drive i then restore the MBR on the new hard drive to make it bootable? remember all the partitions have been copied 1 by 1 and all their respective files.only thing is the MBR AND IPL.

230bg data includes everything including os. as i said once copied i need it to boot as before and therefore need some software to make it bootable. the boot.ini file above will not work by itself i take it.

the old one only has about 230gb of data on it...

i understand acronis true image can do this but remember this new hard drive is smaller and i do not want to shrink partitions to make them fit onto new hard drive. i just want to copy/paste all the files and if required skip certain files or damaged sectors which unstoppable copier can be set to do after so many tries. unstoppable copier can also be set to Pause while copying to avoid stressing the old hard drive and allow it to cool or just rest. only thing is how do i make ithe new drive bootable. what software would make it bootable without installing an OS. IN WINDOWS THERE MUST SOME EXE FILE WHICH IS RESPONSIBLE FOR MAKING IT BOOTABLE OR WRITING THE BOOT RECORD. I SHOULD POINT WINDOWS ME WAS INSTALLED FIRST ON C: AND XP WAS ADDED LATER

it is a compaq computer and i wonder if this will work? http://www.ehow.com/how_7299027_use-compaq-recovery-partition.html

thanks for all your detailed help jaclaz. i downloaded bcd 1.7.2 and followed the steps here :- http://apcmag.com/how_to_dual_boot_vista_and_xp_with_vista_installed_first__the_stepbystep_guide.htm?page=4 and will boot now although it seems even slower then before with frequent lockups even although all tweaks ,etc have been tried. it is clearly worst os ever. the hard drive does have a recovery partition d: and i was wandering if it would be possible to restore a fresh copy of vista from d: to c: as my son has downloaded hundreds of games and probably buggered it as when it was fresh it was not as bad as this. any idea how i can use the 12gb recovery partition to fix vista and make it fresh?

i have a 500 gb pata hard drive with 4 primary partitions.it boots from c: which has windows me and the other partitions windows xp modified/optimized for different things. on c: it has windows me on d: xp1 , on e: xp2 , on f: xp3 thus when i start the pc i can boot into windows me or xp1 or xp2 or xp3 via windows bootloader. like this:- [boot loader] timeout=30 default=C:\ [operating systems] C:\="Microsoft Windows" multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional 1 photoshop" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(3)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Gameing" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(4)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect this 500 gb hard drive is 3 years old and showing signs of wear and tear. on partition d it has a 32k bad sector and on f: it makes a clicking noise occasionally. c: is 26 gb and has 10 gb free d: is 18 gb with 5gb free e: is 400 gb with 235 gb free f: is 22 gb with 9 gb free i want to transfer all the data and operating systems to a new 250 gb pata hard drive with 4 primary partitions in a similar configuration. the new drive partition e: will be just big enough to accommodate all the stuff on or original partition e: with very little empty space left over. instead of cloning the whole drive sector by sector which would be stressful on the hard drive and difficult because of the bad sector i want to copy/paste partition by partition all the files onto the 250gb hard drive.also not much software which can clone from a larger hard drive to a smaller one. i will use hiron cd bootdisk and use unstoppable copier to copy partition by partition from original hard disk to new hard disk. the question is how would i make the new hard drive bootable exactly as before without installing an operating system from scratch on the new 250 gb hard drive.

Let's clear the possible misunderstanding. And no, BCD itself won't probably be of use. When you install an OS; it will boot from FIRST hard disk. (normally and specifically from Active Primary partition of FIRST hard disk). If you added a "new", second hard disk, and did not remove/disconnect the "old" first one, the former will be second disk. When you install XP, it will: overwrite the MBR (containing the VIsta MBR) of the FIRST hard disk with the XP one (this normally is NOT a problem unless you use bitlocker) overwrite the PBR (or bootsector) of the active partition on FIRST hard disk (containing Vista boot code invoking BOOTMGR) with XP one (invoking NTLDR) Quite obviously XP install cannot know nothing about Vista, so it doesn't provide for a way to ADD to it's booting scheme, based on NTLDR+NTDETECT.COM+BOOT.INI, a previous install of a later OS. Now what you need is two-fold: you need to restore the Vista boot then use bcdedit, EasyBCD or any other BCD editor to add to the BCD an entry for booting XP. An alternative is chainloading from NTLDR/BOOT.INI a third party bootmanager capable of directly chainloading the NTLDR and the BOOTMGR, like grub4dos. In the Active, Primary partition of your FIRST disk you should have: BOOTMGR \boot\BCD\ NTLDR NTDETECT.COM BOOT.INI Then get grub4dos from here: http://code.google.com/p/grub4dos-chenall/downloads/detail?name=grub4dos-0.4.5b-2011-05-09.7z&can=2&q= Open it in 7-zip and extract ONLY the file grldr to the active primary partition of first hard disk. Now open the BOOT.INI on first hard disk and add to it a line: C:\grldr="grub4dos" Save and reboot. You should land to a chioice between Windows XP and grub4dos, choose grub4dos. You should land to a grub> prompt. In it type: chainloader /bootm and press [TAB] key. You should be able to see bootmgr listed (and the line should autocomplete to) chainloader /bootmgr if not type the missing characters until it is complete as per above. Then press the [ENTER] key. Now type: boot and press the [ENTER] key. Additional info in the Guide: http://diddy.boot-land.net/grub4dos/Grub4dos.htm The Vista should boot normally. It is possible that you will also find added an option to boot XP "automagically". If not it's time to use a BCD editor to add an entry for XP. Reboot and repeat the above, veryfying that the entry in BCD works, ie: choice between XP and grub4dos choose grub4dos repeat given commands at grub4dos prompt choice between Vista and Xp choose XP you should now have looped to #1 above choose XP verify it boots OK Then: reboot choice between XP and grub4dos choose grub4dos repeat given commands at grub4dos prompt choice between Vista and Xp choose Vista verify it boots OK Then, still booted in Vista you need to run bootsect.exe /NT60 C: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc749177(WS.10).aspx in order to restore the PBR/bootsector code to the one loading Vista's BOOTMGR Some details of how a "normal" XP+Vista boot are here: http://www.multibooters.co.uk/multiboot.html with pictures. You are currently in this situation: You have to get into this one: Booting Vista: Booting XP: jaclaz Thanks jaclaz for that long and detailed post.it sounds really complicated. does that men that EasyBCD is no use as they claim it is easy to use it to restore the bootloader using easybcd. also they also have a vista repair iso to download as well to burn to cd and use that to restore the bootloader. does that mean using easybcd or repair disc is no use.?

but i never installed anything on the home vista hard drive.i installed xp on the new and SEPARATE hard drive. this would mean the vista installation should be untouched by the xp installation. how would easybcd help?

it worked for me the extensible counter tool which is what i meant. but also the larger cluster sizes reduces the splitting of files to fit them and re-assemble them. next time i will try 64 k clusters.i wish we could do it up to 1.024 megabytes.with large drive dirt cheap the slack does not matter. everyone should try this by using the larger cluster sizes.

by using 32k clusters instead of default 4 k either NTFS OR FAT you can make make xp and your hard drive much faster as fewer read write operations are required by at least 32k/4k = 8 times! also by disabling performance logging/montoring useing win2000 group policy control software you can make xp about 20% faster. anyone tried it?

i had a preinstalled vista home edition on a 160 gb sata hard drive on a hp computer bought from pc world but because it is so slow and frustrating to use even after all the tweaks and uninstalling the presinstalled bloatware i opened it up added a new added a second sata 200gb hard drive. i then installed windows xp on the second hard drive.it works great,is very fast and very responsive. however i can no longer boot into vista at all. when booting i go to boot options,select the second hard drive and boot in xp. however when i go to boot options and select first hard drive to boot from vista it still boots from the second hard drive into xp. the vista hard drive can be seen from the xp installation and is fine. occasionally you do get a very brief message saying NTLDR missing press cntrl+cntrl+delete and then boots into xp. any idea how i can still boot into vista to access some of the programs on it.

NEWS:- Hackers have siphoned more than half-a-million pounds from UK bank accounts since July using a variant of the Zeus banking Trojan, according to security company M86. M86 discovered the theft after gaining access to a command-and-control server in Moldova, the company said in a paper published on Tuesday (PDF). Between 5 July and 4 August, hackers stole £675,000 from the customers of one of the biggest UK financial institutions, according to M86. Mark Kaplan, M86's chief security architect, told ZDNet UK on Wednesday that just under 37,000 British computers had been infected by the Trojan as part of the attack, with around 3,000 bank accounts compromised....read the rest of the article first. HERE:- http://www.zdnet.co.uk/news/security-threats/2010/08/11/zeus-attack-nets-675000-from-uk-bank-customers-40089796/ The question is :- Can this and similar trojans work just as well on 9x systems or just on more complex systems like xp and vista as due to their increased complexities they have more entry points. Also do you have to prove to the banks about these trojans which is impossible for Average Joe to do or will the banks just weasel their way out and not refund their customers? Are passbooks in person accounts safer then online accounts which are increasingly easier to steal from?

Anyone know of a reliable way to clone vistato a different sata hard drive o the same computer in case of hard drive failure. Someone said i could use acronis baclup/restore and simply copy the vista partition to the new sata drive but i don't know if this will work,but then they said i should use the copy function in acronis true image...i am confused now. again xxclone has also been mentioned but is unclear if it will actually boot as it copies file and does not do sector by sector coping... i just want to do a straight forward clone of vista home edition from the original hard drive to the new in the same computer in case of failure and also i want to try dual boot the original hard drive with xp and don't want to lose vista ,if it does not work out ,hence the cloned requirement. the new hard drive is 200gb the original is 160gb. sorry for the spelling but this keyboard is failing...arrghhh.

I guess there is some confusion in terms, (and you need not to SHOUT ). The term "cloning" is deceiving. A "clone" is an EXACT copy of something else. Strictly speaking you cannot "clone" a single partition, you can only "clone" a WHOLE hard disk, unless you re-place the "cloned" partition in exactly the same position and with exactly the same size as it was. Most "cloning" softwares however do make an exact copy of the source partition AND allow it to be restored on a different position on hard disk OR to shrink it/enlarge it. (which of course is not anymore a real "clone") If the target drive is NOT already partitioned, it is relatively straightforward. If the target drive is already partitioned, you need to shrink existing partition(s) to allow for the creation of the new "cloned" partition. If you want to REPLACE an existing partition with the "cloned" image, obviously data on the previous partition will be lost, as it will be overwritten. What you may want to explore is another approach, i.e. file-based copy, something along the lines of what XXCLONE (a very good example of an improperly named program ) does: http://www.xxclone.com/ http://www.xxclone.com/itheory.htm But the real problem, if I may, is well before the imaging/cloning one, you are saying that you have 700 Gb of valuable data stored on that hard disk ONLY, that you have NO current backup of them (you should have TWO backups of that data) and you are not even going to back it up once in this occasion. Your data is at great risk anyway, you shouldn't even think about doing "heavy" drive operations without a valid backup (actually TWO). jaclaz Thanks for that. Would using xxclone replace existing data , i mean 700gb of data already on it? Also the xp i am copying is on partition E and and would be copied to Partition E also on the new 1 terabyte bdrive and the question would it actually boot since i understand some xp flies like NTDLR and Boot files are located on C partition...Would xxcopy copy these too or would it be done manually? Would i need to remove the original hard drive before booting up the new or or does xxclone solve this. I did the FAQ on the xxclone website but these issues were not made clear....

If you clone patrtition to partition and there's enough space on the target for all the data on the source to fit, most cloning programs should allow you to do that. Unless I'm missing something here. That would be great but i am terrified that the existing 700gb of data on partition on the new 1 terabyte hard drive would be wiped. surely the xp partition would replace the700gb partition and data would be gone. Has anyone cloned a drive but the destination partition had some data on it.WOULD THAT DATA REMAIN OR BE WIPED?

I want to clone xp which resides on a 3rd partition of a 4 primary hard partition 500 gb hard drive. i.e hard drive has windows me on c,data on d ,xp on e,data on f. i want to clone xp on partition e: with all it's applications to a different 1 tb hard drive to 3rd partition e: also with 4 primary partitions.( c,d,e,f). Now i cannot use partition cloning tools as the 1tb hard drive has a huge amount of data on partition in excess of 700gb. i was wandering if it possible to install xp on 1 tb hard drive,on partition e: and then import the xp registry from 500gb xp and copy/paste all the program files. will this work?

IIRC its all built into the one slider, when its set in the middle (point 6) there is zero acceleration and the more you move it right the more acceleration you get, the left ...less. NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. you are wrong...very wrong. in windows me u have accel not in server 2003 ... why?

It does on mine yes,yes i have that too.that is NOT what i am talking about..... i am talking about pointer acceleration and scale. i want to move the mouse 2 or 3 cm and have the pointer move across the whole screen and not just 4 inches only....

I have a problem ...I have to move the mouse a lot to move the a lot pointer a lot...This is very annoying. i.e to move the pointer on screen a 4 inches across the screen i have to move the mouse about 2 inches. i want to be able to move the mouse 2 cm and hve the mouse move 4 inches quickly. i s there any software or registry method to get these options in windows server 2003? It makes the pointer sluggish.I have looked at control panel but no mouse acceleration exists in mouse control panel. (Pointer Acceleration. This option allows you to change the relationship between the distance that the mouse pointer moves on the screen and the relative movement of the physical device itself (which may be a mouse, trackball, or some other pointing device.) A high value for the acceleration multiplier will lead to large movements of the mouse pointer on the screen, even when you only make a small movement with the physical device. Tip A multiplier between '1x' and '3x' will works well for many systems. With a multiplier over '3x' the mouse pointer may become difficult to control). This option does not exist in Server 2003. How can I solve this?

A "Your browser is no longer supported. Please upgrade to a modern browser|." As you all may know youtube has dropped support for portable firefox 2.00.20 and nagged for a month to upgrade to a different browser like ie8,safri,chrome,opera,firefox 3.6,etc. on windows me only opera and k-maleon work. firefox 3.6 will not install on windows me. i tried opera and k -maleon and they both work for youtube but they are clunky and both have WAY TOO MANY OPTIONS AND PANELS AND WIDGETS and other things that need to be configured for hours and hours.I mean it is just ridiculous. also i cannot get them to look like portable firefox 2.00.20 too much feature creep. is there a way to GET firefox 2.00.20 to report it is version 3.6? i have not tried YET the about:config and typed version in filter and you can modify that and i was wondering if that might fool youtube? Any ideas? or are their things you can do to fool youtube that firefox 2.00.20 is firefox 3.6? how do they know which version of firefox i am using? how can we misinform them?