XP/Vista dual boot now xp dead 1

[EdDuck]

XP Media Center Edition installed on new computer. Installed Vista on seperate partition after "UPgrades" were mailed out.(last year) All was working fine until....

Some things were not working properly any more so I figured I needed to "refresh " XP.

Ran the XP CD, chose install> upgrade and went about other chores, Inserted disk#2 when asked then somewhere in the process needed files could not be found on the CD. I swapped CD's even tried an XP pro CD incase it might have been on it. All to no avail.

Now its an endless cycle of "previous version of windows" the XP screen then reboot.

Put the vista disk in and "fix MBR" I can now use vista but not XP. I would reinstall XP But I would like to OT have to reinstall all the other programs / games.

Thanks for helping
Ed

Both MCE and Pro are SP2

 

[linney]

To get XP Media Center going again you might have to do a repair installation. You will lose all your windows updates but your files, programs and games will be untouched.

How to Perform an In-Place Upgrade (Reinstallation) of Windows XP (Q315341)

http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/q315/3/41.asp

The chances are that re-installing XP and running MBR fixes on Vista has damaged the dual booting and XP bootup.

See if these programs can sort out the booting problems.

VistaBootPRO

http://www.vistabootpro.org/

Used EasyBCD

http://neosmart.net/dl.php?id=1

See if these will boot you into XP?

HOW TO: Create a Boot Disk for an NTFS or FAT Partition in Windows XP(Q305595)

http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/q305/5/95.asp

How to Use System Files to Create a Boot Disk to Guard Against Being Unable to Start Windows XP (Q314079)

http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/q314/0/79.asp

See if these help.

Windows Vista no longer starts after you install an earlier version of the Windows operating system in a dual-boot configuration

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/919529/

In a dual-boot configuration, Windows XP does not start if you subsequently format or delete the partition on which Windows Vista is installed

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/922809

Re-install XP on a dual boot XP/Vista PC

http://groups.google.com/group/micr...repairing+xp+dual+boot+vista#7c1cb798c8480967

 

[EdDuck]

Thanks linney.

Looks like I have my work cut out for me.

 

[N0ktar]

I would suggest using Microsoft Virtual PC 2007 or VMWare for all of you that require XP while running Vista. It is a lot better solution than dual boot OS.

dual boot OS is so 90's