So I’ve had XP home for a while, and then upgraded to the Pro Edition (that was a mess, but that’s a thread on it’s own). Anyways, now everytime I reboot, I have the option of loading “Microsoft Windows XP Pro Edition” or “Microsoft Windows”, luckily the default is XP Pro and it does it automatically if I’m not sitting there after 15 seconds or so. Anyways, I finally decided just now to see what happens if I hit the other choice. Well, not much, I get a bunch of errors and then if wants to go to safe mode, because it thinks a bunch of files are curroupt. I told it to boot normally, and it just gave me a c prompt. So really, there’s nothing there, it’s just somehow left over from before. I rebooted, did what I normally do, and now it’s fine. Does anyone know how to get rid of the other option. I Know I could figure it out if I wanted to, I just thought I’d see if anyone knew off the top of their head.
Also has anyone converted to NTFS, I’m still trying to decide if I want to do that.
This happened to me too, did you have a successful install? At first I wasn’t able to “upgrade” from Home to XP, so I used the Home disc to get the option to upgrade then swapped discs and it worked like a charm.
I won’t be able to help you with your problem as I always do fresh OS installs, but I am curious as to why you “upgraded” to pro from the home version? I was on the release candidate program with MS and the versions I tested were Pro, but when it actually came time that I wanted to buy a version I bought the home one. So far, I really can’t see a difference other than I know of some network admin features that the pro version has.
So why did you switch?
The options are in boot.ini in the root directory of the C drive. I don’t remember where XP moved the stupid setup for it (it seems to move with every version of windows) so I always just edit the file directly. You can delete options for screwed up parts of windows that are no longer there, and can also set the timeout to whatever value you like. Make a backup copy of the file before editing if you don’t know what you are doing, so you can replace it if you really whack it out.
If you go to NTFS then you will not be able to boot from a dos disk if all goes sour. It’s a one way conversion. You can go from FAT32 to NTFS, but you can’t go back if you later decide you don’t like it.
This is based on W2K but it is about the same:
Right Click, ‘My computer’
Click ‘Advanced’ tab
Click settings under ‘Startup and Recovery’
Where it says ‘Defauly operating system’ there’s a checkbox labled: Display list of operating systems for: (15) seconds
If you uncheck that it will breeze through to XP.
Actually, on Xp I think it says something like:
‘time to display list of operating systems’ and there’s another checkbox, but I’ve not played with XP much - but it’s in the same place.
This is based on W2K but it is about the same:
Right Click, ‘My computer’
Click ‘Advanced’ tab
Click settings under ‘Startup and Recovery’
Where it says ‘Defauly operating system’ there’s a checkbox labled: Display list of operating systems for: (15) seconds
If you uncheck that it will breeze through to XP.
Actually, on Xp I think it says something like:
‘time to display list of operating systems’ and there’s another checkbox, but I’ve not played with XP much - but it’s in the same place.
Damnit, trying to sound professional and all I get is a double post.
I don’t know about the OP, but I installed Pro to get IIS.
This is Microsoft’s side by side comparison of XP Pro and Home.
I have XP Pro on my home machine, and I would never install Home edition if I could have Pro. Home is basically a neutered version of Pro, and I’d rather have those extra options (like remote desktop) than one day need them and not have them.
Also, for the OP, I did convert to NTFS. It’s more secure and allows you more customizable User Access options. If I don’t want another user to see my files, I can set it up that way, and only an Administrator can change that. NTFS is also less prone to fragmentation and crashing, although with XP I haven’t had a crash in seven months, anyway.
I would highly recommend a clean install of XP, if you want your problems to go away. If you can back up all your data, and then just fdisk the whole thing, you’ll find it runs much better than just upgrading from another OS.
Good lord did they ever bury it in XP.
This is in XP pro -
Start -> my computer -> control panel -> performance and maintenance -> system, then click on the tab for advanced, click on the settings button next to startup and recovery, and click on edit, and the stupid thing finally pops up boot.ini in notepad.
Sheesh!
You can fiddle with the settings without clicking on edit, but you can’t get rid of a bogus entry.