Windows 10: Dual Boot Windows 10 with Windows 7 or Windows 8

How to: Dual Boot Windows 10 with Windows 7 or Windows 8

How to Dual Boot Windows 10 with Windows 7 or Windows 8


Information Windows 10 is here.

This tutorial will show you step by step on how to dual-boot Windows 10 with Windows 7 or Windows 8.



Note Windows 10 System Requirements

See also: Minimum hardware requirements - Windows 10 hardware dev

• Processor: 1 gigahertz (GHz) or faster
• RAM: 1 gigabyte (GB) (32-bit) or 2 GB (64-bit)
• Free hard disk space: 16 GB for 32-bit OS 20 GB for 64-bit OS
• Graphics card: Microsoft DirectX 9 graphics device with WDDM 1.0 driver
• Display: 800x600 screen resolution
• Internet access to activate

Additional requirements to use certain features

• Cortana is only currently available on Windows 10 for the United States, United Kingdom, China, France, Italy, Germany, and Spain.
• Speech recognition will vary by device microphone. For better speech experience you will need a:
  • High fidelity microphone array
  • Hardware driver with Microphone array geometry exposed
• Windows Hello requires specialized illuminated infrared camera for facial recognition or iris detection or a finger print reader which supports the Window Biometric Framework.
• Continuum is available on all Windows 10 editions by manually turning “tablet mode” on and off through the Action Center. Tablets and 2-in-1’s with GPIO indicators or those that have a laptop and slate indicator will be able to be configured to enter “tablet mode” automatically.
• Music and Video stream through the Xbox Music or Xbox video app available in certain regions. For the most up to date list of regions, please go to Xbox on Windows website.
• Two factor authentication requires the use of a PIN, Biometric (finger print reader or illuminated infrared camera), or a phone with Wi-Fi or Bluetooth capabilities.
• The number of applications that can be snapped will depend upon the minimum resolution for the application.
• To use touch, you need a tablet or a monitor that supports multi-touch. (more info)
• Microsoft account required for some features.
• Internet access (ISP) fees might apply.
• Secure boot requires firmware that supports UEFI v2.3.1 Errata B and has the Microsoft Windows Certification Authority in the UEFI signature database.
• Some IT administrators may enable Secure Logon (Ctrl + Alt + Del) before bringing you to the log in screen. On tablets without a keyboard, a tablet with the Windows button maybe required as the key combination on a tablet is Windows button + Power button.
• Some games and programs might require a graphics card compatible with DirectX 10 or higher for optimal performance.
• BitLocker To Go requires a USB flash drive (Windows 10 Pro only).
• BitLocker requires either Trusted Platform Module (TPM) 1.2, TPM 2.0 or a USB flash drive (Windows 10 Pro and Windows 10 Enterprise only).
• Client Hyper-V requires a 64-bit system with second level address translation (SLAT) capabilities and additional 2 GB of RAM (Windows 10 Pro and Windows 10 Enterprise only).
• Miracast requires a display adapter which supports Windows Display Driver Model (WDDM) 1.3, and a Wi-Fi adapter that supports Wi-Fi Direct.
• Wi-Fi Direct Printing requires a Wi-Fi adapter that supports Wi-Fi Direct and a device that supports Wi-Fi Direct Printing.
• To install a 64-bit OS on a 64-bit PC, your processor needs to support CMPXCHG16b, PrefetchW, and LAHF/SAHF.
• InstantGo works only with computers designed for Connected Standby.
• Device encryption requires a PC with InstantGo and TPM 2.0.

Windows 10 full localization languages

Arabic (Saudi Arabia), Bulgarian (Bulgaria), Chinese (Simplified, China), Chinese (Hong Kong), Chinese (Traditional, Taiwan), Croatian (Croatia), Czech (Czech Republic), Danish (Denmark), Dutch (Netherlands), English (United Kingdom), English (United States), Estonian (Estonia), Finnish (Finland), French (France), French (Canada), German (Germany), Greek (Greece), Hebrew (Israel), Hungarian (Hungary), Italian (Italy), Japanese (Japan), Korean (Korea), Latvian (Latvia), Lithuanian (Lithuania), Norwegian, Bokmål (Norway), Polish (Poland), Portuguese (Brazil), Portuguese (Portugal), Romanian (Romania), Russian (Russia), Serbian (Latin, Serbia), Slovak (Slovakia), Slovenian (Slovenia), Spanish (Spain, International Sort), Spanish (Mexico), Swedish (Sweden), Thai (Thailand), Turkish (Turkey), Ukrainian (Ukraine)

Additional languages available as Language Interface Packs



Warning Before you get started installing Windows 10, be sure that you UEFI firmware settings. Some motherboards do not support booting from a USB flash drive with these enabled.

Once installation has finished, you can enable Secure Boot and Fast Boot again if you like.


EXAMPLE: Dual Boot Windows 10 with Windows 7 or 8







Here's How:

1. If you plan on installing Windows 10 to another partition on your Windows 7/8 drive or other drive, then be sure that you have created a new partition large enough for Windows 10. (see screenshot below)



Note If you plan on installing Windows 10 to a separate empty hard drive, then you do not need to do anything in this step.






2. Do step 3 (USB at boot) or step 4 (ISO/USB in Windows) below depending on if you want to install Windows 10 at boot with a USB flash drive or with the ISO file.


3. To Install Windows 10 as Dual Boot at Boot with USB
A) If you have not already, you will need to create a bootable Windows 10 installation USB. You can use the same methods below for with or without UEFI.

B) Boot from the USB flash drive on your computer.

C) Pick up at step 4 in this tutorial (click on link).

D) At step 11 in the same tutorial (click on link) select the drive or partition you want to install Windows 10 to. (see screenshots below)







E) After restarts during the installation, you will need to click/tap on Windows 10 in the Choose an operating system screen to continue with setup until finished. (see screenshot below)




4. To Install Windows 10 as Dual Boot with ISO or USB inside Windows 7 or 8
A) If this is for using a connected Windows 10 installation USB, then go to step E below.

B) If this is for using a Windows 10 ISO file, then go to step C or step D below.

C) In Windows 8 and 8.1, mount the ISO file, and go to step E below.

D) In Windows 7, you will need to extract the files in the ISO to a new folder on your desktop, and go to step E below.

E) Open the USB flash drive or mounted ISO, and open the sources folder. (see screenshot below)



F) Run the setup.exe file in the sources folder to start Windows 10 Setup. (see screenshot below)



G) If prompted by UAC, then click/tap on Yes.

H) Click/tap on the Go online to install updates now option. (see screenshot below)



I) Windows Setup will now check for and install any available updates. (see screenshot below)



J) Pick up at step 7 in this tutorial (click on link).

K) At step 12 in this tutorial or step 13 in this tutorial select the drive or partition you want to install Windows 10 to. (see screenshots below)



Note Selecting to install Windows 10 on a formatted partition or drive with a drive letter will have Windows 10 show the same drive letter when you running Windows 10 instead of the usual C: .

If you selected to install Windows 10 on an unallocated partition or drive at boot, then either Windows will show as C: while running and the other as another drive letter.









L) After step 14 in that same tutorial, you may be prompted to select your Region and language settings, and click/tap on Next. (see screenshot below)



M) After restarts during the installation, you will need to click/tap on Windows 10 in the Choose an operating system screen to continue with setup until finished. (see screenshot below)








That's it,
Shawn


Related Tutorials

• How to Create a Bootable USB Flash Drive to Install Windows 10
• How to Clean Install Windows 10
• How to Upgrade to Windows 10
• How to Reinstall Windows 10 with this media
• How to Install Windows 10 as Virtual Machine in VirtualBox
• How to Install Windows 10 as Virtual Machine in VMware Player
• How to Change Time to Display List of Operating Systems at Startup in Windows 10
• How to Choose a Default Operating System to Run at Startup in Windows 10
• How to Change Operating System Name at Startup in Windows 10

:)

 

windows 10 vs windows 7

If there are supported Windows 7 drivers, yes, you can dual boot, learn how:

How to:
Dual Boot Windows 7 or Windows 8 with Windows 10 Installed First

 

Re installing Windows 7 or 8.1

If there is a specific reason you need to run Windows 7 or Windows 8.1, you could always dual boot:

How
to: Dual Boot Windows 7 or Windows 8 with Windows 10 Installed First

 

I guess so. My dual boot setups with W7/W10 and W8.1.1/W10 still show C: for whatever I started up in. I suppose as long as both OSs are running fine, I wouldn't worry to much about it.

A few questions to see if anyone else with the same may also see this.

What other OS are you dual booting with?

Did you install W10 on a separate hard drive or on another partition with the other OS?

Are you using UEFI?

 

I am dual booting with 8.1 Pro

I installed W 10 on a separate hard drive, I looked at your tutorial and that is the way I did it (Mounting the ISO way)

I am using UEFI

I will boot into 8.1 and check for any issues now and post back.


Restarted, booted into 8.1 all is good.

 

Did you boot your install disc or did you start the install from within windows? I have seen that happen before when starting the install from within 7 like you do an upgrade or a repair?

 

Charlie, I did it from within windows


Edit to add disk management ss

W10






8.1

 

That shouldn't happen when running the setup.exe from inside the sources folder though. It's for doing a custom install same as if doing so at boot.

If you ran setup.exe in the root directory, then it would do an upgrade install.

I must admit that I'm not sure what caused it to do this, but as long it's working perfectly fine is what counts.

 

That may be why, I clicked the one it the root drive first, then realized my mistake and cancelled and went into the source folder and ran it.

It seems to be running fine so I may try to live with it, OCD permitting *Redface

 

Ah, that could be why then.

 

With previous OS's to run the installer from the existing OS can lock out the drive letter so that C isn't available. I'm about to run Sources/Setup to install to a small partition on my laptop here on the road so will test it for 10.

 

Hey Greg, Good to see you. We will need your expertiese to keep all of the newbs in line!! *Tongue

 

Dude,

I'm fixing to test this in a VM. Did you install W10 on an "unallocated" drive, or what it already formatted as E: ?

 

I clicked on my drive, but do not remember if it said unallocated. I just chose it, as it's the separate drive I put in for W10.

 

I just thought about this and checked, I do have the windows.old file as if I did an upgrade. So it seems that even though I canceled the install after mistakenly starting from the root folder, the cancel didn't change it.

I suppose I could use disk management to remove the partitions it added, reformat the other drive and install again.