Windows 10: dual ( 7 / 10 ) boot question

i'm building a new windows 10 desktop to replace current windows 7 desktop but since all my software is only guaranteed to run on 7 i plan to build the new desktop as a dual boot ( 10 + 7 ) first and then eventually ( in a year or two ) convert to 10 only.

i haven't purchased any parts yet but i will be using intel X299 platform, tentatively Asrock X299 taichi motherboard and either 2 or 3 Samsung 960 Evo M.2 SSDs 250 GB each in RAID 0.

so the plan is set up the raid with total 500 GB and create a 100 GB partition for each windows with 300 GB unallocated space. the unallocated space will allow me to expand either partition as needed in the future. then eventually i will remove the windows 7 and its partition.

the question is what would be right way to do that - should i install windows 10 first or windows 7 first ? ( to make sure the 10 continues working once 7 is removed )

if removing windows 7 partition is too dangerous i would have to go with 3 X 250 GB SSDs and a total of 750 GB space in which case i would never need the extra space freed from windows 7 and i could leave both OSs forever but it would be a waste of extra $150.

i hope the question is clear, if not - let me know.

:)

 

Dual-boot Windows 7/10 or 8/10; does pestering stop?

I understand dual-boots and have built a few of them. That's not my question.

Suppose I build a dual-boot 7/10 or 8/10. Given the high degree of pestering Microsoft is doing to 7 and 8 users to get them to move to 10, will Microsoft continue to pester me when I use the 7/8 half of a dual-boot? Does Windows Update still offer the many
move-to-10 upgrades or does that stop?

 

Dual boot installation?

I currently dual boot Win 7 and Win 8 on my Dell PC. I want to do the clean install of Win 10 on the Win 8 partition. My question is will it affect the Win 7 partition and will I be able to dual boot win 7 and Win 10?

Thanks,

Brian

 

Always install the oldest OS first, if you can, when setting up dual booting. So that would be Windows 7 first. Installing the newest OS last will update the boot files to their latest version. Installing the older OS last will downgrade the boot files to a previous version - you may still get dual booting with an older menu style - or it may break booting the newer OS altogether.

 

thanks. i read that you should generally install older system first when doing dual boot but then i came across a thread ( don't remember where ) where a guy had two operating systems on two separate hard drives and when he simply unplugged one hard drive the other wouldn't boot because some sort of boot partition was on the drive he unplugged even though the system he wanted to boot was on the other drive that was still plugged in. his problem stemmed from him unplugging the drive where the FIRST operating system went which also received the boot partition, which got me worried about installing first the system that i want to eventually delete ...

however in my case i won't be unplugging anything and both OSs will be on the same RAID so obviously different situation ...

so are you saying it doesn't matter which of the two OSs i plan to eventually keep ? i should still install the older one first ?

EDIT: as i mentioned previously if there is no safe way to remove one OS and reclaim the disk space without risking ruining the other then i have the option of keeping both forever - i would just need to start off with a bigger raid because on my current system i just ran out of 256 GB SSD drive C ( with all storage on separate rotational drive D ) so for the next build i want to have available 500 GB for windows 10 plus 250 GB for windows 7 or 500 GB for both IF i will eventually be reclaiming the space used by the 7. these will be only for OS / program files. i will move the rotational drive D with all my files from old desktop to new without touching anything on it.

 

Make sure you are installing SP1 Windows 7 64-bit. That is the only version of Windows 7 that will install in UEFI mode. Windows 7 and Windows 10 both, by default, create a separate partition containing the boot files. In legacy BIOS the boot partition is called a System Reserved partition. In UEFI, the boot partition is called the EFI System Partition. When you are installing Windows, it will look for an existing System Reserved or EFI System partition that the computer is normally booting from. If it finds one, then it adds the Windows being installed to the existing partition - it will not create a new one. That is why when a person installs a second version of Windows onto a second drive, it will stop booting if they later remove the first drive. The second Windows did not create any new partitions for booting - it only added the second Windows to the already existing boot partition on the first drive.

In your case, you will be installing the second Windows into a separate partition on the same drive. If you remove either Windows installation by removing or reformatting it's partition, the boot partition will still be on the drive and you will continue to have boot capability. The only thing you will be "breaking" is the pointer in those boot files to the Windows that you delete. It's only when you remove the System Reserved or EFI System Partition that you damage booting - such as reformatting the entire physical hard drive/SSD or removing it from the computer.

 

I would strongly suggest separate SDD for one of Windows. M2 RAID0 + dual BOOT on it is just asking for trouble.

 

The problem with this is when I uninstall windows 7 the space will be wasted as I won't be able to add it to the raid with windows 10 on it.

Anybody else think my plan is asking for trouble ? My win 7 is on SSD raid right now - two 128GB sata SSDs.

 

There is no reason to use raid with ssd`s.

Why don't you just install 10 and see if the software you need will run on it.

 

I watched a video where they specifically tested the raid I have in mind - 3 x m.2 SSDs and they said it was worth it ...

As for why not try windows 10 first ... It seems stressful. I want to get everything over with in a few hours and get on with life.

 

Why not W10 first ? Because second OS will "take over" BOOT sector and UEFI and you would want W10 to handle that.
I don't know why you want them in RAID 0, any error on any disk in that RAID will break everything. both of your OSs too. SSDs are fast enough as singles and RAID can bring you only some bragging rights without much of real world increased performance. It's also slower to BOOT because of raid drivers and BIOS have to set it every time.
As for "couple of hours for setup" forget it, if you are not really proficient with RAID, it's gonna be more like couple (or more) days.

 

But it's free - you think I can resist that ?

 

There are other "free" things but you have to wash your hands after !!

 

on my current raid i did run into a problem as follows - my power supply started failing and system started giving errors and crashing - i had no idea it was power supply until it eventually exploded but before it did the computer tricked me into resetting bios into default because i thought bios was the problem - this disabled the RAID and the system would not boot ... however when i went into bios and re-enabled RAID and replaced the PSU it was as good as new ... so in my very limited experience RAID isn't really that scary ...

also while i had rotational drives fail and usb drives fail i never had an SSD fail yet so again, based on my limited experience i am not super worried about SSD failing and taking down the raid with it ...

but most importantly the motherboard has three m.2 slots which means spreading the load across 3 flash controllers ( which can get hot enough to throttle even with a copper heatsink ) thus increasing total IOPS and i can't resist the urge to take advantage of this ...

only other option would be to get HHHL ( half height half length ) enterprise SSD with like 1 TB capacity which would match the performance of three M.2 drives in raid ... but not only would this be expensive it would take the last PCI-e lanes on the mobo and i would have nowhere to put my firewire adapter for my firewire soundcard ...

i mean i guess i could figure something out if i really wanted to but M.2 raid would be a super clean solution for me ...

EDIT: besides, even if the RAID array fails my data is on a separate rotational drive anyway so it won't be affected ...

 

What`s free ?