Has anyone dual booted the Surface Pro 3?

[apricotslice]

I'm wondering if anyone has dual booted the Surface Pro 3 with an earlier version of windows like Vista or XP?

Can it be done?

If so, what was lost when booted into the older OS?

I'm assuming you lose the touchscreen, and a lot of screen resolution. But will it otherwise function properly?

Obviously it wont be connected to the internet, so any vulnerability of the older OS is not an issue. Reason for considering this is a program which only runs on Vista or earlier, for which the output is best suited on a tablet. Also only considering this with the shifting of most other programs onto a brand new current version Surface Pro.

Anyone done this?

[pjknibbs]

Could you not install the old Windows in VirtualBox and run the program that way?

[apricotslice]

Could you not install the old Windows in VirtualBox and run the program that way?

I am. But I hate having to do that. It's flaky at best, and failed last time I tried to use it, for no apparent reason. It's also a total pain to backup, since its over 40gb in size, when all I need to backup is the data. Open the thing up, and it take ages to backup next time you do one.

It also requires transferring the output back to win 8.1 in order to use it properly.

I got to the point where I resurrected an old XP computer to run it on instead since it's less messy to use it there, and transfer the output. But a tablet is a much better option than a PC.

I'd much rather boot into Vista, and use everything normally. If it can be done.

[Ronald Sandoval]

i dont know what a surfce pro is but can you not try and boot it from a flash drive

[red assassin]

Virtualisation seems like the best plan. If you're having trouble with VirtualBox, maybe try Hyper-V. Either way you can set up a shared network between the guest and the host and share folders between them, so that should make backing up and data sharing easier.

Another option might be to run the older machine somewhere else and just RDP into it from the Surface.

I'm assuming you've tried compatibility mode and so forth to get this app running on Win 10?

[apricotslice]

I'm assuming you've tried compatibility mode and so forth to get this app running on Win 10?

It's not a compatibility problem. The setup program checks what OS is running, and because 7 and higher are not on its list, the setup is aborted. So far I've not been able to determine how it checks, in order to fool it. And since it needs a runtime installed at boot time for any other part of it to run, and I cant find where in the registry this exists, I cant just install elsewhere and port it over.

I've not heard of Hyper-V, but the whole virtual machine thing is getting really old. I'd prefer a better option.

[pjknibbs]

It's not a compatibility problem. The setup program checks what OS is running, and because 7 and higher are not on its list, the setup is aborted.

Have you tried changing the compatibility mode settings for the setup program itself? I think you can actually configure those so Windows reports an older version to the program, allowing it to install.

[apricotslice]

It's not a compatibility problem. The setup program checks what OS is running, and because 7 and higher are not on its list, the setup is aborted.

Have you tried changing the compatibility mode settings for the setup program itself? I think you can actually configure those so Windows reports an older version to the program, allowing it to install.

Yes. It doesn't work.

I think they hardcoded a test in the setup, not using the compatibility mode at all.

I'm going to try it again though, but first I have to install visual studio 2008. Might be a while.

[apricotslice]

No luck.

I'm wondering though if it's possible to copy in an old windows directory from a vista install, renaming vista, and that might somehow supply what the program is looking for?

Comments?

Or we get back to if it's possible to dual boot the Surface pro.

Edit: I tried copying in a Vista install, but no joy. The setup program has to finish, and there appears to be no way of getting it to.

So back to a dual boot Surface Pro?

[Redvers Ganderpoke]

but the whole virtual machine thing is getting really old. I'd prefer a better option.

Old? Not as old as the software you are trying to run.

I strongly suspect that the UEFI Bios wouldn't allow 'old' OSes to run. Windows 10 pro natively support VMs (hyper V) and it quite easy to backup over a network as you just copy the entire virtual disk.

Edit: just had a thought, are you sure the installation is failing because of the OS?

[apricotslice]

Old? Not as old as the software you are trying to run.

I strongly suspect that the UEFI Bios wouldn't allow 'old' OSes to run. Windows 10 pro natively support VMs (hyper V) and it quite easy to backup over a network as you just copy the entire virtual disk.

Edit: just had a thought, are you sure the installation is failing because of the OS?

Old as in I'm sick of the clumsy way it works. And copying the whole virtual disc turns a couple of minute backup into a 15 minute one. Which means waiting for it to complete.

The setup program comes up and says one of a list of OS is not installed.

[red assassin]

As others have said I very much doubt you'll get a museum piece OS booting on this hardware. If VMs and running it elsewhere and RDPing to it are out and you want to try and continue fooling the setup tool, try ProcMon (which is an official Microsoft tool). Reading ProcMon traces takes a little practice, but it'll tell you what files and registry keys the setup tool is touching; if it's looking at one of those to determine its Windows version you'll be able to see what it's doing and supply whatever it's looking for and not finding. I'd be fairly optimistic about that working; as pjk says compatibility mode causes Windows to straight-up lie to API calls asking for the Windows version and so on. However, if it's doing something particularly esoteric to check the Windows version, you ought to be able to catch it using API Monitor (unlike ProcMon this is not an official Microsoft tool, though), but that generates even more data than ProcMon does.

[apricotslice]

As others have said I very much doubt you'll get a museum piece OS booting on this hardware. If VMs and running it elsewhere and RDPing to it are out and you want to try and continue fooling the setup tool, try ProcMon (which is an official Microsoft tool). Reading ProcMon traces takes a little practice, but it'll tell you what files and registry keys the setup tool is touching; if it's looking at one of those to determine its Windows version you'll be able to see what it's doing and supply whatever it's looking for and not finding. I'd be fairly optimistic about that working; as pjk says compatibility mode causes Windows to straight-up lie to API calls asking for the Windows version and so on. However, if it's doing something particularly esoteric to check the Windows version, you ought to be able to catch it using API Monitor (unlike ProcMon this is not an official Microsoft tool, though), but that generates even more data than ProcMon does.

Tried Procmon. Records the tree when I just want the nut. Just too much information.

How do I get it to only display the installation process? I see it has filters, but no idea how to use them.

Ideally, I'd like to set it up before hand to just display the installation process, and nothing else. Can it be done?

[Redvers Ganderpoke]

What software is it?

[red assassin]

Tried Procmon. Records the tree when I just want the nut. Just too much information.

How do I get it to only display the installation process? I see it has filters, but no idea how to use them.

Ideally, I'd like to set it up before hand to just display the installation process, and nothing else. Can it be done?

You want to add a filter (filters menu is ctrl+L) for "Process Name" "Is" "setup.exe" then "Include" (replacing setup.exe with whatever the setup binary is actually called). You can leave the default list of exclusions. In the right-hand side of the toolbar in the main window, there's buttons to turn different event types on and off, which you can play with. You can set more specific filters in the filter dialogue if you need to.

[Lwerewolf]

No CSM support, so anything below windows 8 (I believe, windows 7 certainly needs CSM) won't natively boot.

Make sure you have bitlocker recovery keys for your partitions before you attempt any modifications to the boot conditions - bootloaders, settings, whatever. Otherwise, kiss your data goodbye.

Otherwise, I've triple booted win10, mint and bliss (x86 android rom). Windows 10 was obviously the most usable. I'd run VMs.