System Restore points and other recovery features in Windows Vista are affected when you dual-boot with Windows XP

The problem:

Windows XP automounts every disk it detects, including external or removable hard disks. As part of the automounting process, NTFS writes to the disk, and these writes are detected by the volsnap.sys driver in Windows XP. Because this version of volsnap.sys does not recognize the persistent shadow copies (also known as restore points) made by the volsnap.sys driver in Windows Vista, Windows XP cannot maintain the integrity of the shadow copy storage area and deletes the shadow copies to avoid corrupting them. Note that dual-booting Windows Vista with Windows Server 2003 or Windows XP Professional x64 Edition will also result in the shadow copies being deleted.

The impact:

When booting into Windows XP and automounting a disk, you will notice the following effects on the disk after booting back to Windows Vista:

• All restore points are deleted from the disk.
• All previous versions of files are deleted from the disk.
• All but the most recent CompletePC Backups are deleted from the disk. The remaining backup made by CompletePC Backup is full and complete and can be used to restore your entire computer.

File backups are not affected because these backups do not rely on restore points.

The workarounds:

• This workaround will require some advanced computer skills and 3rd party software!

The goal here is to remove or hide the Vista volume when booting into Windows XP in a dual boot or multi-boot environment. This is where the 3rd party software comes into play. BooIit NG (or BING) from Terabyte Unlimited is a partition and multi-boot manager with a powerful and simple-to-use set of tools for partitioning, imaging, and multi-booting your computer. The folks Terabyte Unlimited have created several tutorial videos to guide you through the process of installing Windows Vista and preventing the loss of restore points and Shadow Copies in Windows Vista.

• BootIt NG tutorial videos
• Support for BootIt NG
• Terabyte Support Newsgroups
• An Introduction to BootIt NG
• Purchase BootIt NG
• Use a Virtual PC application such as Microsoft Virtual PC.

Warning: Read these two articles before creating partitions when dual-booting Window XP & Vista!!!

The partition that hosts Windows Vista may disappear if you use Windows XP to create a partition on a computer that has both Windows XP and Windows Vista installed

A more in-depth analysis on disappearing partitions by Walter Clayton MS-MVP

Related Articls

Dual booting Windows XP

No restore points are available when you use Windows Vista in a dual-boot configuration together with an earlier Windows operating system

How restore points and other recovery features in Windows Vista are affected when you dual-boot with Windows XP

Windows Vista no longer starts after you install an earlier version of the Windows operating system in a dual-boot configuration

In a dual-boot configuration, Windows XP does not start if you subsequently format or delete the partition on which Windows Vista is installed

You cannot start Windows XP after you install Windows Vista in a dual-boot configuration together with Windows XP

The computer continuously restarts after you unsuccessfully try to install Windows Vista on a Windows-based computer

Copyright © 2005 - 2008 Bert Kinney