How to create a partition for Vista so XP still works?

[Octopuss]

A little confusing thread name maybe, so I will mane it clearer:

How to create a partition so I can still normally boot XP after I get rid off Vista?

Some months ago I tried to play with Vista a bit and I beleive it messed up the boot loader that was originally present, resulting in not being able to boot XP at all after. Any way to prevent this?

[spacesurfer]

We need to know more about your system configuration.

You are saying right now you have both XP and Vista but only able to boot Vista but not XP?

What are you drive letter assignments?

Are you trying to reinstall or recover the installation? I didn't get whether you still want to keep both or just want XP now??

Remember, Vista boot loader can boot XP and Vista but XP boot loader cannot boot Vista.

[Octopuss]

Well, atm I got XP only and it is and will be my main OS. All I want to do is create new partition where I'd install Vista. They thing is whether it will or will not be a problem if I decide to erase the Vista partition completely. The Vista will be for temporary testing puroses only.

XP - C:

DVD - D:

Vista - whatever available

[spacesurfer]

As long as your XP partition (C:) is active and primary, the boot files will be copied to C: and when you get rid of vista, you should still be able to boot XP via the vista bootloader. However, you may want to restore the XP boot loader if you get rid of vista using bootsect.exe. See the pinned topic about that in Vista section - how to install xp after vista and restore boot loader.

[Octopuss]

thank you!

[Octopuss]

Weird stuff happening. I installed in the new partition F:, and it refuses to work. Vista installed, but after I try to boot into it, I get error about winload.exe and some 0xc000000f code. Whoa :-O