Windows XP/98 Dual Boot?

[Krazi]

Alright here's my situation. I installed Win XP on my system (fresh install) with the NTFS file system. Then I built a new system and my wife inherited my old system. I installed her old hard drive as a second hard drive in her XP system. The 2nd hard drive has Windows 98SE installed on it. The computer normally boots into XP fine. Now, she needs to boot into Win98 in order to connect to her office VPN (the firewall software is not WinXP compatible). Is this possible without wiping one or the other hard drives? If not, it's possible for me to wipe the Win 98 drive and install Win2K. Would that allow me to dual boot?

 

[HitmanXP]

Well i think if u want Windows 98 ...it has to be 1st ...then XP ...anything like Me,95,and 98. As far as Windows 2000 Professional goes...u can install it 1st or 2nd so..i would do that...Windows 2000 is a stable OS.

 

[kerykeion]

Short method w/ IDE drives (in theory, it should work):

If the 2nd hard drive (w/ Win98) is a Primary Slave or Secondary Master/Slave, then go into the BIOS and see if you can alter the bootup order so that the Win98 drive will boot before the WinXP driver (I'm guessing is Primary Master)

I don't think that would work though since some BIOSes don't have the option to change the boot order among IDE devices.

Longer method (very unconvenient, but guaranteed to work): Take out or unwire the WinXP hard drive completely from the computer/motherboard and use the Win98 drive as the Primary Master...voila!

 

[BD231]

<<If the 2nd hard drive (w/ Win98) is a Primary Slave or Secondary Master/Slave, then go into the BIOS and see if you can alter the bootup order so that the Win98 drive will boot before the WinXP driver (I'm guessing is Primary Master)>>

This works, I've done it quite a few times. Just install 98 on a seprate drive and change your boot sequnce when ever you want to use Windows 98. This is the most simple , straight forward way to do it.