Dual booting from Windows 7 hard disk and a Windows 7 VHD file

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I have Windows 7 Enterprise edition installed on my laptop on the real physical hard disk. Now I want to create a vhd partition on the c:\ root directory and be able to dual boot into my real machine or a vhd that also runs Windows 7. Is this possible at all and if, yes how. If I try to do it, the installation on the VHD says that it is going to rename some operating system files that it found on the C:\ drive.

senf

Posted 2009-09-21T21:32:41.443

Reputation: 177

Answers

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Scott Hanselman has a great write-up on this:

http://www.hanselman.com/blog/LessVirtualMoreMachineWindows7AndTheMagicOfBootToVHD.aspx

I think the only risky operation is that you will be mucking with boot loader, but it seems to be pretty close to a "just works" operation.

Haven't tried it myself yet (don't have the space).

Nicolas Webb

Posted 2009-09-21T21:32:41.443

Reputation: 562

3

EasyBCD 2.0 has a new feature to support VHD booting. It's far easier to use. See the release notes here for more info.

Mahmoud Al-Qudsi

Posted 2009-09-21T21:32:41.443

Reputation: 3 274