Howto: 10.4.8 + XP + Vista on Dell Inspiron 9400

[ltickett]

After a little trial and error i've managed to get my Dell Inspiron 9400 working triple boot with XP and Vista!

 

I used bootit to make life a little simpler although OSX seems to handle the multi-os selection really well (when i now boot from the OSX partition and hit enter for startup options i get a menu allowing me to chose which partition to boot from!

 

My machine has; 1.66ghz core duo, 1gb ddr ram, 120gb hd, 256mb ati mobility x1400, intel wireless, sigmatel audio, broadcom 10/100

 

I started by booting the machine using bootit and cutting the 120gb drive into 3x20gb + 1x60gb;

1) 20gb OSX filesystem

2) 20gb ntfs filesystem

3) 20gb ntfs filesystem

4) 60gb fat32 filesystem (because osx cant read/write ntfs)

 

I set the 20gb OSX parition active, disabled the second core in the bios and rebooted with the 10.4.8 install disc. I used disk utility to format the drive before installing OSX.

 

NOTE: I had a lot of trouble as the hacks section only displays 2 items yet there are tons of hidden items in the menu! Tick the whole hacks group and then manualy untick the NVIDIA + ATI options (result in black screen)

 

The install was pretty quick and painless, once booted i updated and installed a few essentials!

 

Now i rebooted and used bootit to create an image of the OSX parition (paste the image on the fat32 parition for safe-keeping)

 

Set the 1st 20gb ntfs partition active, enable the second core in the bios and reboot with the Vista install disc!

 

Again, the install was quick and painless, once i booted i updated, installed a few essentials and voila!

 

Again i rebooted and used bootit to create an image this time of the Vista parition (pasting on the fat32 parition for safe-skeeping)

 

Finally, set the 2nd 20gb ntfs partition active, reboot with the XP install disc, install, update etc...

 

Boot using bootit; image the parition onto the fat32 partition for safe keeping. Install bootit on the fat32 parition and set it active!

 

Reboot and voila! Triple boot; OSX, Vista, XP

 

Note: As already stated in various posts no sound/wireless (or CI/QE support) through OSX