Dual boot

by Colin MY COMPUTER TUTOR

I've cracked it!

After lots of research and then taking several deep breaths, I've managed to set up my laptop with Vista AND Windows 8. It's all a bit geeky-techy, but you can create a separate space on the hard drive (a partition) and then install Windows 8 on that.

This is known in techie-circles as a "dual boot". If you're keen to try it, follow the excellent instructions on Mashable tech

The link itself is:
http://mashable.com/2012/11/08/dual-boot-windows-8/#1006651-Get-Windows-8

I know it talks about keeping Windows 7, but it works for Vista as well. Having said that, I found that my Vista wouldn't open the Windows 8  .iso file that I carefully downloaded and saved to a DVD disc,  but when I did it again and saved it to a memory stick (OK..."flash drive", if you insist!), it worked easily.

No, I have no idea why. I'm not a techie!

So there you are. You can have a go at Windows 8 without losing your "old" operating system. When you start your computer, you are given the choice of the two systems. It will default to Win 8 after 5 seconds, but you can change both the default system and the time delay.

I just wish I knew about this earlier! As I moaned in my last post, Windows 8 wiped out my installation of MS Office 2007 - and some other stuff. Did I say that Microsoft are getting greedier and greedier? I think I did. Very little is "bundled" with Win 8. There's not even "Microsoft Works", the free office suite that they always provided in the past. It was a simple version of Office, but good enough for most home users. (Someone told me that "Microsoft Works" was a great example of an oxymoron.....)

Back to the Start

Another moan I had about Win 8 was the absence of the Start button, leading to the Start Menu. I find the Start Menu really useful, so imagine my joy at finding a download which restores a Start Menu to Win 8. This came from a newspaper cutting which a client gave me today, after I persuaded him not to buy a new computer but to stick to his ancient IBM running XP. 

The cutting was taken from the Daily Telegraph 24th November and if you read it, you can find the link to StartMenu8

Well, there y'go! I've given you the link anyway!

Once you've downloaded this, you also get the chance to turn off the Windows 8  "Metro" Play School desktop and those  "pointy-in-the-corner-peek-a-boo" gizmos that the poor gentleman in the video on my last post failed to find! You won't need them if you've got the Start Menu. In fact you can make the whole desktop just like Windows 7.

I'm very pleased with this, as it gives me an option to offer to my more-experienced clients who have to buy Windows 8 in the future. They can still have something that looks familiar.



Colin