Dual booting Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2
I’ve been using Windows 7 as my primary OS on my laptop (a nice shiny new Dell Studio 17) for a little while now. I’ve found it almost as stable as Vista, definitely faster and some of the new features are very useful – the wireless connection stuff is much better for example. However, the lack of any hypervisor-based virtualization product with it means I have to use Windows Server 2008 for many work-based things.
Now, with both Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2, you can boot from a VHD file. Why is this great? Well, my laptop only has one disk partition and I can’t be bothered to resize it (and no, using DISKPART doesn’t work – I have 0B available to shrink). It also means that I can stick in my USB stick with the Windows Server 2008 R2 install files on, open a command prompt (using SHIFT+F10 when the first dialog box pops up) and type:
diskpart
create vdisk file=D:\VHDs\Win2k8R2.vhd type=expandable maximum=32768
select vdisk file=D:\VHDs\Win2k8R2.vhd
attach vdisk
exit
I can then continue the install – it does complain about not being able to boot from this volume, but don’t believe it. Just press next and the whole thing works like a dream.
When you boot Windows 2008 Server R2 from a VHD, can you still run Hyper-V? I know with Windows 7, VHD booting has a couple of side effects such as no Hibernate or Windows Experience score.
I already have Wins7 installed. Can I install Sr2008, using the VHD method, on the same machine with W7? W7 will not be in a VHD.
Thank you,
Rob,
Thank you so much for the posting! I would like to ask you a question regarding of dual boot windows 7 Ultimate edition and Server 2008 Enterprise edition(64 bit). I installed the window 7 on the C drive, then I installed server 2008 on second of partition from C drive which is not VHD. It totally bootable from both of OS. My window 7 is working very well including wire and wireless internet connection. However, When I log into server 2008 as administrator, it does not have network connection (No internet). and it said that my fast ethernet driver encounted problem with error code 10, So I updated the ethernet driver, and it turn out to be I have most updated driver. I even add roles for wireless Lan service, TCP/IP service from server, but still does not have any network connection. The ethernet network connection is perfectly fine when I was using the window 7. I really have no idea what caused not to have network connection in server 20008? Please help!! I appreciate in advance!
Hi John,
Not entirely sure – are both Windows 7 and Server 2008 x64 editions? With Windows 2008, you have to not only install the WLAN role but start the service too – it won’t be started automatically if I remember rightly. Other than that, Windows 7 has more drivers out of the box than Windows 2008 (assuming you’re not using R2) – have you applied SP2 for Windows 2008? Have you tried searching on both Windows Update and the manufacturer’s website for drivers?
Hope this helps,
Rob