Vista - Can Vista be installed on an external USB hard drive?

Can Vista be installed on an external USB hard drive?

A friend has a laptop with a 20GB HDD.
Could he install Vista on his external drive without messing up XP on
his main drive?

Would it have to be a dual-boot system, with the bootloader on C:?
--
Chris

"Chris" wrote

> Can Vista be installed on an external USB hard drive?
>
> A friend has a laptop with a 20GB HDD.
> Could he install Vista on his external drive without messing up XP on
> his main drive?
>
> Would it have to be a dual-boot system, with the bootloader on C:?


No

--

Rock [ MVP User/Shell]

"Chris" <nospam@[127.0.0.1]> wrote in message
news:7C1AHWb5RhIFFwYO@[127.0.0.1]...
> In article <OeWGDsr5GHA.3452@TK2MSFTNGP05.phx.gbl>, Rock <rock@nospam.net>
> writes
>>"Chris" wrote
>
>>> Can Vista be installed on an external USB hard drive?
>>> A friend has a laptop with a 20GB HDD.
>>> Could he install Vista on his external drive without messing up XP on
>>> his main drive?
>>> Would it have to be a dual-boot system, with the bootloader on C:?
>
>>No
>
> Is that a "no" to the first question?
> Is there any way for him to try Vista?
> --
> Chris

Vista cannot be installed on an external USB hard drive.

--
Frank Saunders, MS-MVP OE/WM
http://www.fjsmjs.com
Answer in newsgroup. Don't send mail.

On an internal hard drive.

--

Regards,

Richard Urban
Microsoft MVP Windows Shell/User
(For email, remove the obvious from my address)

Quote from George Ankner:
If you knew as much as you think you know,
You would realize that you don't know what you thought you knew!

"Chris" <nospam@[127.0.0.1]> wrote in message
news:7C1AHWb5RhIFFwYO@[127.0.0.1]...
> In article <OeWGDsr5GHA.3452@TK2MSFTNGP05.phx.gbl>, Rock <rock@nospam.net>
> writes
>>"Chris" wrote
>
>>> Can Vista be installed on an external USB hard drive?
>>> A friend has a laptop with a 20GB HDD.
>>> Could he install Vista on his external drive without messing up XP on
>>> his main drive?
>>> Would it have to be a dual-boot system, with the bootloader on C:?
>
>>No
>
> Is that a "no" to the first question?
> Is there any way for him to try Vista?
> --
> Chris

"Chris" wrote

Rock writes

>>"Chris" wrote
>
>>> Can Vista be installed on an external USB hard drive?
>>> A friend has a laptop with a 20GB HDD.
>>> Could he install Vista on his external drive without messing up XP on
>>> his main drive?
>>> Would it have to be a dual-boot system, with the bootloader on C:?
>
>>No
>
> Is that a "no" to the first question?
> Is there any way for him to try Vista?
> --
> Chris

Vista can't be booted from an external drive. Of course he can try vista.
There are several options.

1. Buy another internal drive, take the first one out, install the new
drive and install vista.
2. Image/clone the current internal drive to an external drive, then
install vista, either clean install or upgrade, on the internal drive to try
it out. Then restore the image or clone when done.
3. Buy a larger hard drive, copy the old to the new, then dual boot with XP
and Vista. Make sure the drive is imaged so that the XP installation can be
restored if something goes wrong during the installation of Vista.

--

Rock [ MVP User/Shell]

Also, you can try with a virtual machine solution.

That is, everything now should not be changed. Just setup a virtual server
2005 R2 into your current Windows XP Professional, and then install Vista as
a guest os.

--
Junxiu Li
Microsoft MVP - Windows Shell /User
http://vista.itecn.net

"Chris" <nospam@[127.0.0.1]> wrote in message
news:4zDQrHYimgIFFwqs@[127.0.0.1]...
> Can Vista be installed on an external USB hard drive?
>
> A friend has a laptop with a 20GB HDD.
> Could he install Vista on his external drive without messing up XP on his
> main drive?
>
> Would it have to be a dual-boot system, with the bootloader on C:?
> --
> Chris

"Chris" <nospam@[127.0.0.1]> wrote in message
news:7C1AHWb5RhIFFwYO@[127.0.0.1]...
> In article <OeWGDsr5GHA.3452@TK2MSFTNGP05.phx.gbl>, Rock <rock@nospam.net>
> writes
>>"Chris" wrote
>
>>> Can Vista be installed on an external USB hard drive?
>>> A friend has a laptop with a 20GB HDD.
>>> Could he install Vista on his external drive without messing up XP on
>>> his main drive?
>>> Would it have to be a dual-boot system, with the bootloader on C:?
>
>>No
>
> Is that a "no" to the first question?
> Is there any way for him to try Vista?
> --
> Chris

What are the other hardware specs, such as memory? A laptop old enough to
come with a 20 Gb HD may have other hardware limitations that make running
Vista impractical.

I haven't tried it but I've heard of someone installing Vista on an external
drive as a virtual machine. You would install Virtual PC (or Server) in XP
on the internal hard drive and then setup a virtual machine on the external
drive.

--
Kerry
MS-MVP Windows - Shell/User
http://www.vistahelp.ca


Chris wrote:
> Can Vista be installed on an external USB hard drive?
>
> A friend has a laptop with a 20GB HDD.
> Could he install Vista on his external drive without messing up XP on
> his main drive?
>
> Would it have to be a dual-boot system, with the bootloader on C:?

A laptop that came with a 20 gig hard drive is likely to be way under
powered to virtualize anything!

--

Regards,

Richard Urban
Microsoft MVP Windows Shell/User
(For email, remove the obvious from my address)

Quote from George Ankner:
If you knew as much as you think you know,
You would realize that you don't know what you thought you knew!

"Junxiu Li" <junxiulee@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:ezshdfs5GHA.2044@TK2MSFTNGP02.phx.gbl...
> Also, you can try with a virtual machine solution.
>
> That is, everything now should not be changed. Just setup a virtual server
> 2005 R2 into your current Windows XP Professional, and then install Vista
> as a guest os.
>
> --
> Junxiu Li
> Microsoft MVP - Windows Shell /User
> http://vista.itecn.net
>
> "Chris" <nospam@[127.0.0.1]> wrote in message
> news:4zDQrHYimgIFFwqs@[127.0.0.1]...
>> Can Vista be installed on an external USB hard drive?
>>
>> A friend has a laptop with a 20GB HDD.
>> Could he install Vista on his external drive without messing up XP on his
>> main drive?
>>
>> Would it have to be a dual-boot system, with the bootloader on C:?
>> --
>> Chris
>
>

Yes, that's it.

But it is also correct according to what Richard said regarding the
performance of Chris's laptop.

--
Junxiu Li [MS-MVP - Windows Shell /User]
http://vista.itecn.net


"Kerry Brown" <kerry@kdbNOSPAMsys-tems.c*a*m> wrote in message
news:eLCEFzu5GHA.1200@TK2MSFTNGP02.phx.gbl...
>I haven't tried it but I've heard of someone installing Vista on an
>external drive as a virtual machine. You would install Virtual PC (or
>Server) in XP on the internal hard drive and then setup a virtual machine
>on the external drive.
>
> --
> Kerry
> MS-MVP Windows - Shell/User
> http://www.vistahelp.ca
>
>
> Chris wrote:
>> Can Vista be installed on an external USB hard drive?
>>
>> A friend has a laptop with a 20GB HDD.
>> Could he install Vista on his external drive without messing up XP on
>> his main drive?
>>
>> Would it have to be a dual-boot system, with the bootloader on C:?
>
>