Re: cross booting
Note that if you are not talking generic Windows machines, then the process
you describe is fairly common. For instance, in embedded systems it's not
unusual for the boot process to load a partition image into memory and then
boot from that image instead of the disk (or ROM device more usually) from
which the boot code was loaded.
Here's an example:
http://www.patentstorm.us/patents/6996706-description.html
The only circumstance I can think of where the hard drive boot process gets
restarted with a standard PC is with some drive overlay software. The first
part of the boot loads a BIOS replacement which then takes over the boot
process. In order to do this successfully the overlay software needs to
look as much as possible like the original BIOS boot code, and to do this it
effectively restarts the boot from scratch once it gets loaded. So if drive
2 has this sort of BIOS overlay software installed, but it was not expecting
to get started from drive 2, and it didn't understand about BIOS settings
that re-assigned the drive order (or, it replaced the code that responded to
those settings), then I guess what you are describing is a possibility.
It's a bit like the process that occurs when you want to boot a system with
drive overlay software installed from floppy - you can actually interrupt it
in the time between loading the overlay and loading the OS, and tell it to
load the OS from the floppy.
--
Jeff Richards
MS MVP (Windows - Shell/User)
"b11_" <b11@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:AA62239E-2E28-48FA-ABD9-2804D510DCD4@microsoft.com...
> Sometime ago, I entered BIOS and selected drive 2, which has W98 on an
> active
> partition, to boot. Well 2 started to boot but then I noticed a different
> drive, which has W98, booting. I beieve that when a drive starts booting
> and
> then another drive finishes booting then that is called cross booting.
> _________________________________________________________
> "philo" wrote:
>
>>
>> "b11_" <b11@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
>> news42BD8D1-1D06-4808-9373-167B61FB2F82@microsoft.com...
>> > I check the Microsoft website but can not find any article pertaining
>> > to
>> > cross booting. Your suggestions please.
>>
>>
>> You will get plenty of results on Google if you use the term "Dual
>> Booting"
>>
>> If you want to mention which OS's you want to run...you can also get some
>> help here.
>>
>> As a general rule however... each OS should be on it's own
>> partition...with
>> the oldest OS installed first.
>>
>>
>>