Cant install Windows XP on Vista???

Tma20SC

New Member
I'm downgrading from vista home premium and i'm trying to install Windows XP Pro but i keep getting a message about "windows has prevented the installation to prevent further damage to computer".

Any help with this issue.
 
Toast the Vista primary and create a new one. The Vista installer places files on the drive that the XP installer can't get around being the newer version. A good reformat if you have the Vista installation disk will work as well as seeing a new primary since both run on NTFS 5.0. To see the Vista boot folder removed that would need to be done anyways.
 
my god... what if i just unplugged my hdd and plugged it in to an xp machine and installed it from there. Just a thought...

srry didn't mention but i'm still gonna keep vista i'm just gonna dual boot.
 
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my god... what if i just unplugged my hdd and plugged it in to an xp machine and installed it from there. Just a thought...

srry didn't mention but i'm still gonna keep vista i'm just gonna dual boot.

Well dual booting helps..... Now we can help...
 
Now you are talking about something totally different like resizing a primary rather then replacing it to see an older version go on. Still have the Vista installation disk or was that a preinstallation there?

Unless you are planing to XP on a separate drive and dual boot that way like done here at the present you will need a partitioning tool. For seeing XP go on you wouldn't install Windows on another system first and try running it that way. After shrinking the current Vista single primary you would create a second for XP to go onto.

If you were planning to reinstall Vista anyways that would make the task easier since it would be done after XP was installed to see the older version added into Vista's own boot loader automatically. Adding XP to Vista sees a few other requirements that have to be met in order to work like making sure XP is running normally since that will knock Vista out at first. You then use the automatic startup repair tool found on the Vista dvd to see Vista booting again.

Making sure the boot files for XP are seen at the root of the Vista primary you then use a freeware over the BCDeditor to make life easier. The EasyBCD 1.7.1 tool will see this done along with a few other things. http://neosmart.net/dl.php?id=1
 
Another option is to install a Virtual PC on your Vista and install
XP within that. There are several free virtual PC programs that you can use. XP runs within Vista and you have the best of both worlds.
 
Hey Talking about Vitural PC
go download VMware it has a free version with no charge

you don't even need a OS to install VMware

you just download VMware and put it into your DVD or CD drive you can install right there

it's pretty cool huh

then you can install XP or Vista or whatever OS it supports
 
Hey Talking about Vitural PC
go download VMware it has a free version with no charge

you don't even need a OS to install VMware

you just download VMware and put it into your DVD or CD drive you can install right there

it's pretty cool huh

then you can install XP or Vista or whatever OS it supports

Well according to microsoft Virtual PC doesn't run on Vista Home Premium. I'll take another route.
 
Well according to microsoft Virtual PC doesn't run on Vista Home Premium. I'll take another route.

It does and it doesn't. I have it on here at times. It will go on but it's simply "not supported" by MS. The Basic and Home Premium editions lack the networking features found in Business and Ultimate. You'll note the reference to XP Pro and server edtitions as well as the two editions of Vista besides the Enterprise.



When running any OS on a virtual machine while being able to save configuration information it's still a temporary method to see multiple OSs able to run on different systems with differing OSs as hosts. The free VM Player's latest version requires name, email address, and country of original as seen at http://www.vmware.com/download/player/player_reg.html

Since someone didn't provide a link that base is now covered. Here it would be used more for seeing Linux running on a Windows machine where I can run various distros without need to change the drive configuration. I've been doing enough of that lately trying to see which way will be best with Linux added to the existing XP/Vista dual boot here. :D

Here's what that looks like when opened up.

 
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