| Author |
Multiple Win 2000 installations on same drive
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| When I prepared for the NT MCSE I installed both NT Workstation and NT Server on the same logical drives (in different directories of course). I could then choose to boot either operating system.
Can I do the same with Windows 2000, or will the second installation overwrite something in the first? I would like to switch between Windows 2000 Server and Windows 2000 Professional.
Also, on a related topic: Would it be possible to gracefully "downgrade" a Windows 2000 Server installation to a Windows 2000 Professional?
Thanks in advance!
Terje | |
| dentonb2000 2001-04-21, 10:26 am |
| you are still able to do this in Windows 2000. The procedure is about the same. | |
| creamy_stew 2001-04-26, 6:40 am |
| Greetings cisco guru!
quote:
Can I do the same with Windows 2000, or will the second installation overwrite something in the first? I would like to switch between Windows 2000 Server and Windows 2000 Professional.
This will work fine. (The 9x screws things up a bit if it's installed after NT/2k, though)
quote:
Also, on a related topic: Would it be possible to gracefully "downgrade" a Windows 2000 Server installation to a Windows 2000 Professional
I'm not really up to speed on 2k but AFAIK, all you have to do is remove the 2k_server directory and edit out the appropriate section from boot.ini
/creamy | |
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| Thanks for your answer creamy (and dentonb2000 too),
quote:
Originally posted by creamy_stew
I'm not really up to speed on 2k but AFAIK, all you have to do is remove the 2k_server directory and edit out the appropriate section from boot.ini
I was afraid of that... The reason I asked this second question is that my girlfriend has a computer that is allready running W2k Server. She really does not need the server and would happily downgrade to Professional if she can avoid reinstalling and reconfiguring everything. I guess this is such an unusual wish that Microsoft does not accomodate it.
Actually she wants to split the drive into two partitions so that she could install Linux on the other partition. But I guess I am in the wrong forum for that discussion 
Terje | |
| dentonb2000 2001-04-26, 8:16 am |
| Unfortunately MS does not support "upgrading" from Server to Professional.
And also, I am still working to get Linux 2.4 based distro to cooperate with W2K and NTFS5. Seems that neither like when the other changes the MBR. I had no problem with the 2.2 based distro's....but for some reason the beta of Mandrake 8.0 reeked havoc.
(Maybe Beta was the culprit, will try again when it is actually released.)
YMMV. | |
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| quote:
Originally posted by dentonb2000
Seems that neither like when the other changes the MBR.
It is probably best not to let them do it. You can have multiboot that does not change the MBR. Let NTLDR do the multibooting, just edit BOOT.INI correctly. Or use LILO but tell it to install in boot record or root block rather than MBR. If security is of no concern I prefer to put NTLDR and BOOT.INI on a FAT partition. Makes rescuing things a little simpler...
As for NTFS5 and Linux, how much are you able to accomplish?
Terje | |
| dentonb2000 2001-04-26, 8:42 am |
| I am able to mount NTFS5 in Linux (I use the riserfs as well). Reads were successful, while writes were not as I do not think the ntfs.o module supports writes yet (I could be wrong here).
After linux modified the MBR, W2K could no longer recognize the tables or partitions but I could boot linux, mount the drive and copy the information that I needed to tape.
Strange. | |
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| Thanks for the info dentonb2000,
quote:
Originally posted by dentonb2000
I am able to mount NTFS5 in Linux (I use the riserfs as well). Reads were successful, while writes were not as I do not think the ntfs.o module supports writes yet (I could be wrong here).
About the same situation last I checked, several years ago.
quote:
After linux modified the MBR, W2K could no longer recognize the tables or partitions but I could boot linux, mount the drive and copy the information that I needed to tape.
W2K puts some of that information into its registry and gets confused when registry info and partition table info does not match.
Probably wise to have a backup of the MBR anyway.
Terje | |
| creamy_stew 2001-04-26, 10:38 am |
| dentonb2000,
So what happens when you repair the MBR from 2000 (like you have to when you install 9x after NT) Are the symptoms the same as if you just installed 2000 first to begin with?
Terje,
Seems I misunderstood you earlier.
Here's an idea (most likely a bad one ) Export the registry from server, remove server (keeping all program directories etc) install Pro. Import the registry.
Most likely it won't work, but it sure would be fun to see smoke coming out of the ears a computer.
/creamy | |
| dentonb2000 2001-04-26, 1:46 pm |
| I tried to use the rescue console to run fixboot fixmbr and neither could recover from the damage.... |
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