====== Clone Windows XP boot partition ======

==== Hardware setup ====

This short howto guide was setup to handle 2 hdd configured as mirrored drives through built-in nVidia 590 SLI chipset. Since the nVidia drivers are not included in Windows XP SP2 setup CD, there are special steps necessary to get a multi-boot environment going.
 
==== Requirements ====

  * Windows XP SP2
  * Boot-US 2.1.6
  * nLite / nLite Windows XP SP2 boot disk with necessary drivers
  * Acronis TrueImage 9.0


==== Initial install ====

The easiest way for the initial install is to use the BIOS' IDE emulation for the SATA drive and install the basic operating system on a separate harddisk not part of a raid set. Except the basic Windows XP, install an imaging software. I use TrueImage 9.0, but I would expect that any other imaging software would do, as long as it is possible to backup and restore the actual system partition.

  - Install Windows XP SP2
  - Install Acronis TrueImage 9.0
  - Backup the system partition just created on the single hdd with TrueImage
  - Restore to the 2 mirrored hdd with TrueImage
  - Disconnect the single hdd

It might be possible to install Windows on 1 of the mirrored hdd before setting up the mirror raid, and then mirroring from the running system partition, but I haven't tried this approach.


==== Initial clone ====

  - disable Boot-US if it was installed before, then reboot
  - Backup and then delete registry key HKLM/SYSTEM/MountedDevices. This is necessary to have XP reassign the devices information when booting from the cloned system partition for the first time.
  - Backup the system partition on the mirror with TrueImage
  - Restore the registry key by executing the backup file created in 2.
  - Create a new partition on the mirror
  - Restore the system partition on the mirror's second partition with TrueImage
  - Install Boot-US with "true hide" option for the 2 system partitions
  - Reboot into the newly created system partition
  - modify C:\boot.ini to reflect the correct partition information
  - reboot into your nLite Windows XP SP2 CD which contains the drivers to the nVidia chipset (to access the raid)
  - select to install XP on the system partition which is currently active (not hidden by Boot-US)
  - DO NOT install XP, but abort installation on the screen asking for formatting the file system. This step is necessary to install a genuine MBR, as Boot-US' partition information was corrupted through the cloning.
  - reboot again into the active partition
  - re-install Boot-US with "true hide" option


==== Clone on existing XP partition ====

In the following steps, XP-source means the XP install you want to clone, XP-dest means the XP install you want to overwrite with the clone.
  - Boot-US must be installed to differentiate between the 2 XP installs.
  - Boot into XP-source
  - backup XP-source and delete registry key HKLM/SYSTEM/MountedDevices. This is necessary to have XP reassign the devices information when booting from the cloned system partition for the first time.
  - Backup XP-source with TrueImage
  - Restore the registry key by executing the backup file created in 2.
  - Reboot into XP-dest
  - Restore XP-dest with the image from XP-source. The restore will require a reboot.
  - After finishing the restore, reboot into XP-dest, which now contains the XP-source clone
  - modify C:\boot.ini to reflect the correct partition information
  - reboot into your nLite Windows XP SP2 CD which contains the drivers to the nVidia chipset (to access the raid)
  - select to install XP on the system partition which is currently active (not hidden by Boot-US)
  - DO NOT install XP, but abort installation on the screen asking for formatting the file system. This step is necessary to install a genuine MBR, as Boot-US' partition information was corrupted through the cloning.
  - reboot again into the active partition
  - re-install Boot-US with "true hide" option