win10/64 laptop, Win XP32SP3 External drive , want to run ext. drive on XP

[astrostrata]

How do I go about operating my old XP computer external drive on Win XP and not Win 10 ?

Many thanks,

Steve

 

[BFG-9000]

While you can install XP to, and boot from, an external USB drive unlike later versions of Windows, your laptop will need XP drivers for everything that you want to work. This means your laptop can't be newer than Sandy Bridge (or Ivy Bridge--if it has discrete graphics and you use Fernando's AHCI driver). USB 3.0 is obviously no-go.

Note also that you will need to install XP, not just use an old installation. Only Win 9x could be transferred to other machines like that because that could fall back to "16-bit MS-DOS compatibility mode" and run in a degraded state until drivers for the new board were installed. A 9x system could even be cloned using only Windows Explorer.

It seems that every iteration of Windows made it less flexible and useful for power-users. Easier for toddlers to use though.

 

[astrostrata]

While you can install XP to, and boot from, an external USB drive unlike later versions of Windows, your laptop will need XP drivers for everything that you want to work. This means your laptop can't be newer than Sandy Bridge (or Ivy Bridge--if it has discrete graphics and you use Fernando's AHCI driver). USB 3.0 is obviously no-go.

Note also that you will need to install XP, not just use an old installation. Only Win 9x could be transferred to other machines like that because that could fall back to "16-bit MS-DOS compatibility mode" and run in a degraded state until drivers for the new board were installed. A 9x system could even be cloned using only Windows Explorer.

It seems that every iteration of Windows made it less flexible and useful for power-users. Easier for toddlers to use though.

 

[astrostrata]

Sorry , I did not understand you . Does that mean that I can or that I cannot set up an XP Virtual Machine to run on the external USB drive ??? or that I need to set up an XP VM inside the new lap top independently of the external drive ?
There are certain programs I need to run in XP.

 

[BFG-9000]

Well sure you can install Windows XP Mode onto an external. The whole point of Virtual PC is it emulates a standard PC, in fact this very one from 1998:

American Megatrends (AMI) BIOS
Intel Pentium II on 440BX chipset
S3 Trio 32 PCI GPU with 4 MB video RAM
Creative Labs Sound Blaster 16 ISA PnP
DEC 21041 or 21140 10baseT Ethernet network card.

As standard as you can get! Needless to say, performance is intended more to be compatible than good, and programs that attempt to directly access "hardware" will fail, but it's a great way to test if programs work in XP.

Emulating XP on a machine isn't the same as running XP on it, but you will still have to install XP to run on the above simulated machine after formatting its virtual hard disk. Of course you first have to install Virtual PC to your internal drive, plus launch it when the external is plugged in and powered on.