Help? Trying to downgrade windows XP > 2000

Hey, basically. I have a CD with 2000 on it, and it works fine etc. But i tried this myself with a partition and ended up losing every single one of my files. Heh. But now ive restored my xp via cds i made when i got the laptop, XP is all dandy and fine, but i want windows 2000. Basically i have no real idea of what i need to do, please dont ask me why i want 2000 lol. So to recap; Im on XP, i want a clean wipe and a fresh 2000 install.

Hi, My best advice on this is to consider buying a new hard drive (they are very cheap now) and get a spare hard drive caddy and screws for your laptop You then can have WIn2K on one hard drive and WinXP on the other. It will take you only a few seconds to switch hard drives (but make sure your laptop is off (NOT sleep/hibernate/Suspend and that the battery is out and power supply disconnected when you switch. This way you have a good system with no potential for conflicts and if one system goes down the other can be up and running in just a few seconds. You will as, always need a valid licence for each of your operating systems. If you want to set up a dual boot system rather than follow the above, then there is a lot of work ahead for you!. Regards paws

I considered dual booting, but thats how i broke it in the first place. Heh. And ide rather not buy anything, do you know how i could do it as i asked? Like a clean wipe and install?

I considered dual booting, but thats how i broke it in the first place. Heh. And ide rather not buy anything, do you know how i could do it as i asked? Like a clean wipe and install?

Hi B0z

When you boot from the win2k cd during the setup stage aren't you given a choice of what to do with the partition? It's been ages since I've install w2k so my memory is vauge.


Keep in mind that you'll want to be sure you have all drivers on hand for your laptop before you start to reformat. If I remember right in the setup you have the option to delete the existing partition, then giving the option to install w2k on that partiton, and a format proir to the install.

If you have any probs or more questions your in very good hands with Paws.

Good luck
Tonka

Keep in mind that you'll want to be sure you have all drivers on hand for your laptop before you start to reformat.

[my bold underline for emphasis] This is critical!

If you are asking if you can install two operating systems, XP and W2K in this case, on the same partition on the same drive, then no, you can't do that. The file system (how the tracks are laid out on the hard disk) comes on-line in the boot process BEFORE any OS is read in. During boot up and after POST, when the BIOS seeks instructions on what to do next, it looks in the "boot sector" on the first hard disk drive. The boot sector contains the MBR - master boot record and is by definition, physically located in Sector 0 - the first physical storage location on the hard drive or boot partition. NO OS has been loaded yet! The BIOS (still pretty dumb at this point) only knows how to tell the drive controller to go to and read the contents of the boot sector, and wait for further instructions. In the boot sector, it learns:

• If and how the drive is partitioned
• Where to go for next set of instructions

The BIOS either hangs, boots to the installed OS, or prompts the user to select a different OS, if another is installed. If only one installed, the user will not be prompted. If prompted and the user selects the 2nd OS, the BIOS then goes and reads the boot sector on the other drive or partition the 2nd OS is installed in. Hope that makes sense.

please dont ask me why i want 2000 lol

Okay, I won't, but I will say it is odd considering W2K was originally to be called NT5.0 until the marketing department got a hold of it, and XP is just W2K with a fancier UI, better hardware and software compatibility, and a few other small extras - in other words, NT5.1. I can see no advantage to stepping back in time and consume hard disk space for an obsolete OS - except to get legal (and that's cool), or perhaps, for nostalgic reasons - but that's JMHO and as Paws mentioned, as long as you have a valid license for each OS installed, it does not matter why. But I am curious!

I considered dual booting, but thats how i broke it in the first place. Heh. And ide rather not buy anything, do you know how i could do it as i asked? Like a clean wipe and install?

This is actually confusing because any computer that has two OSes "installed" - by that, I mean, either can be used to boot the system, then that's dual-booting, whether it is from two separate hard drives, or two separate partitions on the same drive.

So, if you don't want the dual boot option, your ONLY choice is as paws recommended and you must use two drives and physically swap them out when you want to swap the OS. Bottom line, if you want the option to select at boot up which OS you use, you must dual-boot. Other wise, you are going to have to come up with another hard drive to swap in and out.

See the Microsoft TechNet article, Installing Windows 2000 Professional. Note where it says:

Installing Windows 2000 Professional on the same partition as the existing operating system for a multiple-boot configuration is not supported and causes the other operating system to function improperly.

Thanks for all the replys guys, they are helping, but im still not entirely sure its 'fixed'

But I am curious!

Really lol, I dont know, im getting a new laptop in about 1 month or so, and so ide like to just mess about on this one, and im interested in W2K. Not a good reason lol but thats why!

Okay so, I also heard that if i inserted the cd i would get the option to delete my XP, but i get these 2 problems.

• When i insert it straight off, windows says it basically doesnt want to go backwards.
• And when i set it to boot from disc in the BIOS, nothing comes up but one error, which i dont remember lol.

Like i said, i dont mind losing everything, breaking it in the first place lost me all my important stuff lol, now i have nothing to lose!
Could it be the disc?



And im also interested in a Windows professional performance edition, but i get the same error when i load from disc upon booting.

And also, my windows XP now is SP2, will an upgrade to SP3 be an upgrade or a full wipe and install?

Random questions i know.

First, SP3 is an upgrade and I must say, after upgrading several systems now - is piece of cake. But then, I keep my systems current and since SP3 is mostly a roll-up of all previous updates, moving to SP3 is not much of an update - and so I idid not expect many problems - but I am pleasanly surprise to find none, so far - with both XP Home and Pro systems.

I suspect what you need to do is reformat your drive before trying to install - then W2K will not find any trace of another OS.

Not a good reason lol but thats why!

Hey nothing wrong with that - if you master installing operating systems on old, proprietary, laptops, you can probably earn a good living! lol

Okay then, thanks! Now, how would i go about formatting my drives? Also, you say old laptops, this things pretty bad compared to the latest things lol, 256mb ram, 1.5ghz I suppose thats one reason i wanna get 2K, maybe it'll be faster?

Okay then, thanks!

Now, how would i go about formatting my drives?

Also, you say old laptops, this things pretty bad compared to the latest things lol, 256mb ram, 1.5ghz I suppose thats one reason i wanna get 2K, maybe it'll be faster?

You should be given the option right at the start to partition and format your drive/partition when you do a "fresh" full install.

I would not expect Win2K to be faster than XP.

Okay so i checked my BIOS, and CD/DVD drive is first. I checked the CD and the install comes up fine but says it doesnt wanna step backwards, so i attempt to do the reboot install as normal. I enter the boot selection screen to verify its on CD/DVD and i press enter over it, it ignores me and boots into XP.

During the boot to the OS CD, BEFORE you install Windows, you should see the option to change the partitions and format - I do not remember the exact wording. You can probably wrestle with all day with just this - if you have another computer - slave this drive off of it and partition/format it from there.

Yeah lol this is very irritating. So i cant dual boot it, and the disk wont load. Im stuffed. Thanks anyway :/ And i dont have another computer, until my new one, but by then i wont want this one anymore. heh.