Vista Clean Install From XP Keep Old Partition?

Hey,

I tried searching for the answer to this but apparently I suck at searching.

I have a laptop that has XP on it and two partitions. I use one partition for OS and software while the other one for storage and backup.

I have a new copy of Vista and wanted to do a clean install (not upgrade). Can I keep the data on the partition and expect it to stay intact after Vista installs?

Are there any tips or tricks I need to know before I proceed? I don't want to wipe out all of my data, that would be disastrous!!! Thanks for the help!

 

As long as the folders on the data partition are not named Windows, Users, or Program Files, it will not touch them. Just make sure you choose the "leave current filesystem intact" option. This will replace your bootloader with the Vista bootloader, change default timeout for OS selection to 30 seconds, and rename XP "Older Version of Windows"
All of this can be remedied using EasyBCD.

 

Just to make sure I understand correctly... I don't want to dual boot. I just want to do a clean install on my C: drive of Vista over my XP installation while still keeping the file system and data on my second partition backed up.

 

Sorry for the misunderstanding. That is also possible, just delete the partition with Windows leaving the data partition intact. Format the unpartitioned space created by deleting the first partition. Just keep in mind that if you wanted to go back to XP through the same method, the data partition will become C:\ and the system drive will become D:\ (Vista's installer has fixed this bug)

 

Cool, thank you for the help!