To set up your PC with Windows 7 without removing the existing installation of Windows XP or Vista so just follow the recipe below. The result is that you will have the opportunity to choose to boot either your existing XP / Vista Setup or Windows 7 in the boot of your PC.
Do the following:
- Download and burn to DVD.
- Partition hard disk.
- Before you can install Windows 7 is the first thing you must do to create a new partition on your hard disk that Windows 7 will be installed to. How do you partition your hard drive will vary depending on whether you have Windows XP or Vista from the latter has a partitioning tool built in.
- Partitioning in Windows XP:
To partition the drive in Windows XP, you need to download a third-party tools. There are a number of possibilities. I recommend the free tool GParted Live CD, a free tool that supports partitioning for both Windows XP and Vista. - To use the GParted Live CD, download it, burn it to a CD and boot your PC from the CD (boot from CD). You will now go straight into the partitioning tool. This is a relatively simple procedure:
# Create a new partition (Create) from the newly freed space.
# Make the changes.
Partitioning in Windows Vista:
Developer in Redmond was straightforward enough to include a disk-partitioning tool in Vista that can shrink the size of a disk to make room for a new partition.
1. Right-click the Computer icon and select Manage. Alternatively, go to Control Panel- System and Maintenance (skip this if you have "Classic" view) - Administrative Tools - Computer Management.
2. Then go to Disk Management.
3. Right click the partition you want to shrink and click Shrink. Remember that Windows 7 will need 16GB of free disk space to allow them to install.
4. When you are finished with this operation, right-click on the job (Unallocated) space and select New Simple Volume. (It is the same as the primary partition and is necessary for you to boot from it).
5. Format the drive to the end and you're ready for the installation of Windows 7.
Installation of Windows 7
Now that you've been away a couple of heavy lifting so it's time with a little plank drive: Installation of Windows 7 on our new partition. Then insert the Windows 7 DVD and restart your computer again to boot from your DVD. Adjust the setup in the BIOS if it is not possible.
When the DVD starts up then just follow the relatively simple installation wizard.
NOTE: When you select installation system so be sure to choose Custom (advanced) and select the partition you set up in advance. Be sure that you select the correct partition!
Once this is done and install authorization is running so you can clean up around your screen in the meantime. The installation program will run through some operations and restarting a few times in the process. Eventually you will be asked to set up an account, enter the license key and configure Windows before Windows 7 is ready for use.
Choice of operating system
Now when you start up your PC (again) so you will have the option to choose between your previous Windows version and Windows 7.
So then you have had in place dual boot feature so you can switch between your existing Windows installation and Windows 7
This is not the only way to set up the ability to boot multiple operating systems on a PC, but this variation is based on free accessible tools and works just fine. Do you have a simpler variation to come up with so feel free to add a comment to this Guide.
