Can XP and Vista share a program folder?

[theramon]

Hi Everyone, I've been doing a little digging and I can't seem to find a good answer to this question.

I'd like to dual boot XP and Vista on the same machine, but this is how I'd ideally like the partitioning scheme to go.

One partition for XP
One for Vista
One for programs (shared between the 2)
One for data

I have this feeling that this is not possible, but I wonder if anyone out there has any insight.
thanks

 

[Kreij]

Are you trying to accomplish this on a single hard drive? (ie. 4 partitions on one hard drive)

 

[theramon]

no, sorry I didn't mention that part.
I have two hard drives in the machine - one (250gb) will be for the OSes, programs and maybe some backup space and the other (400gb) will be primarily for data.

 

[FreedomEclipse]

Im not quite sure how programs can be 'shared between the 2' Vista is a total different get up compared to XP so you CANT have 1 program supporting both O/S's in the 1 same installation unless your a programmer & possibly willing to infringe some copyrights...

its either one or the other - there is no inbetween. the only way past this is if u install the program twice - once under XP & once under vista.

however there are a few programs that will run reguardless of what O/S you first install them under but they are very rare & since the general O/S architechture has changed you wont be able to find programs like that anymore

 

[Kreij]

One of the problems is having Vista and XP sharing programs. Each OS is going to want to have registry entries for the applications, and the applications themselves may contain configuration files that are OS specific. You may have to have multiple copies of the applications loaded.

Here is what I would do ...

Go get yourself another hard drive. Load Vista on one, and XP on the other. Load the applications for each OS on the same disks that as the OS and then leave the third for data. That way if one of the hard drives takes a crap you can still run from the other OS (unless it is the data HD, in which case you can restore from the backup. You will be backing the data up won't you? Please say yes.)

 

[newtekie1]

I think the main thing he is trying to do is cut down on wasted space by having the same program installed in two different locations.

This is enitrely possible, but as others have said, you will need to install the program twice. Once in XP and once in Vista. Just point both to the same folder during the install. There are a few programs that can only be installed on the C: drive(Office is one that comes to mind), that you will have to install in different locations, but most software should ask you where you want it installed.

 

[AsRock]

You can share program to some point yes. It depends on the program though. Some programs do not need reinstalling trial and error.

Which programs are you talking about ?. Games typically don't mind

 

[theramon]

I'm thinking about mainly music software, Finale, Reason, Cubase. Office stuff would be nice too but not entirely necessary.

Oh, and I'm a backup fiend.

 

[Kreij]

It's good to know that you do regular backups.
The one thing to consider, however, is that if you put the programs seperately on a partition (or drive) that in the event of failure neither XP or Vista will be able to access them even though the data is intact. When you go to restore the programs you may have to do twice the work again for each OS (depending on the program) to make them function again.

Is there any real reason you want both XP and Vista? Why not just pick one and go with it?

 

[AsRock]

i use 4 partitions XP, Vista, Games and Apps. This way it makes life easier when it's time to reinstall Vista.