Should I dare to put XP on a new Vista oem laptop

[vfknh]

Hello,

I did buy an new laptop this week, it has Vista home on it.
I do not want to use Vista.
But because of the 2 years warranty I want to let Vista on the
harddisk.
So, I want to create a partition for XP.
Is it save to use DD ?
Reading the forum there are a lot of problems.
Will my harddisk boot the two OS's?
And can I use my recover DVD's for Vista oem later on, or
do I first have to delete the XP partition to get the
original state of the HD?
And do I ever can get the original state by deleting and
remerging with the first (Vista) partition?
I hesitate, help anyone?

Thanks,

Fred

[Earthling]

Your laptop will have come with recovery disks, or a means of creating them. You are free to install anything you like on it, because you could at any time restore it to its 'factory gate' state with the recovery disks, though that would also remove whatever it was you had installed in place of Vista. That problem could be solved though by using an imaging system, such as Acronis.

It is possible to dual boot XP and Vista, but only straightforward if XP was installed first. It can be done the other way around but does require some rather fundamental changes to the boot setup, so not really recommended for those not familiar with such issues.

Another consideration is the availability or otherwise of XP motherboard drivers for this new laptop. Check the makers website for these, because if they don't exist the project is a non-starter anyway.

Is there some particular reason you don't want Vista? It's on SP2 now, and is a nice system - far preferable to XP imo.

[Robin A.]

If the computer was bought on June 26 or after, you can change to Windows 7 for free when it becomes available, using the MS upgrade program.

[vfknh]

Earthling,

Perhaps windows vista is ok?
But when I use it, my printer doesn't work, my internet
usb modem doesn't work, my flatbed scanner doesn't work,
even my intuix flash drive 8Gb is not working.
And a lot of programs like partion magic = not working.

How do I get rid of Vista?
And playing around: What is MBR error 3?

Greetings

[Earthling]

The reason printer, modem etc aren't working isn't Vista's fault, it's because you are using your original drivers when setting things up, but these drivers are for XP, not Vista. Depending on the age of your peripherals there might well be Vista drivers available on the maker's websites, but in the case of Partition Magic it just doesn't work with Vista, period, so an alternative partitioning program would be required if you need one.

But coming to your question of how to get rid of Vista and replace it with XP, you first absolutely must establish that you can get XP motherboard drivers for that machine - graphics, sound, USB, NIC at least. If you can obtain them fine, if not it will never work with XP.

If you still want to go ahead then do create your Vista recovery disks first, and then use an XP installation (EDIT - not recovery disk) to reformat the drive and install.

[Earthling]

A further thought on this - it would be worth having a look at Vista's Device Manager to see if it would be possible for Vista to find the drivers for you, rather than you having to go hunting for them. This would need a working internet connection on the Vista machine, but that is all. Just right click a problem device and click on Update Driver Software.

There is a far higher probability of finding Vista drivers for your peripherals than there is of finding XP drivers for your mobo.