deloreanrocks Posted May 10, 2007 Share Posted May 10, 2007 Im pretty sure this SHOULD be straightforward, but id hate to screw myself over.. I have an XP machine with multiple HD's..i use the other HD's for backup purposes (work with a lot of audio and video) If i were to have OSX86 *cough* and wanted to install OSX on one of my other HD's and leave my XP install intact..what would be the best option? I just want to be able to boot into either OS (i actually have 2 installs of XP right now, so when i restart, i have a boot menu to choose from) and not to screw up my XP install in any way, cause id be dead. Also, what would be the best way to go about formatting the extra drives (IE, any particular programs of choice?) thanks! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deloreanrocks Posted May 10, 2007 Author Share Posted May 10, 2007 Edit.. I have three drives, but one of the drives is 250 gigs and i have it split into three partitions...I just want to format one of the partitions for OS X.. thanks! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Oracle67 Posted May 10, 2007 Share Posted May 10, 2007 Make one partition for Os X Fat32 primary, not logical and name it "Macintosh HD", and another one Fat32 swap small enough just to communicate partition with partition and storage purposes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deloreanrocks Posted May 10, 2007 Author Share Posted May 10, 2007 nothing else special i need to do? when i restart my machine, how is it going to show up as far as boot selection? and if i were to just wipe a whole drive, then all I would need to do is format the whole thing FAT32 and install OSX just like i would on any other computer, right? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Oracle67 Posted May 10, 2007 Share Posted May 10, 2007 If you wipe the entire drive no neaded to format. DisK Utility will do that in installation progress. You will chose the entire HD to erase and is done. if you r going to use dual or mor boot better use an OS Selector. Acronis OS Selector is ok for me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deloreanrocks Posted May 10, 2007 Author Share Posted May 10, 2007 Not sure if this matters, but after i burned the iso to DVD, just to check it, i booted off it (booted fine) and i took as far into installation as "select destination"..no drives showed up, but also no drives were formatted at all, two had XP on them and the other is used for storage.. Also, just a side note here, am I going to be able to read my XP storage drives after i install OSX (like will i be able to access files that are currently on my XP installtions? a lot are video/audio/graphic in nature and i would be editing them sometimes in XP, sometimes in OS X, and also for stuff like iTunes..i dont want to have to have two copies of my iTunes library, id like my XP and OSX itunes to read off the same library.. thanks! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Oracle67 Posted May 10, 2007 Share Posted May 10, 2007 Forget about your XP drivers on Mac Os X. Is a different platform. You can acces NTFS partitions or discs but you cannot write. You can acces FAT32 partitions and disc and you can read-write. If graphics and sound works the way it must...it is much better. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deloreanrocks Posted May 11, 2007 Author Share Posted May 11, 2007 thanks, ill probably give it a run through tomorrow on a seperate HD, and ill check out the boot selector you reccomended Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deloreanrocks Posted May 11, 2007 Author Share Posted May 11, 2007 I got it installed fine on its own HD (i formatted the drive with the OS X dvd and setup 2 partitions) but when i reboot after install, it just takes me to my XP installation..im not sure about how to do the whole boot selecting part yet.. - Update - When I restart my computer and select the HD with OSX on it to boot from (in the regular BIOS) i get "_$" and thats it.. If I have the OSX DVD in the drive and im at the install screen where I can run disk utility and the terminal and everything, i can open up "startup disk" but when i run it, the only available choice is the OS X DVD, not the drive that I just installed the OS onto..any ideas? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Oracle67 Posted May 11, 2007 Share Posted May 11, 2007 Just install and activate the Acronis OS Selector from Windows. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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