Accidentally installed XP over OSX and now stuck

[LittleJoe]

What the title says... In a rush (and fit of stupidity) I installed XP on what must have been the OSX partition and now the computer only boots up in XP. I put in the OSX install disc and I get nothing.

Help

(computer listed below)

 

[jsw]

You'll need to format the drive.

Insert the install disk, reboot, and hold the 'C' key to cause it to boot off the DVD.

Once that comes up, one of the options is to format the drive. Do that, then reinstall OS X, then redo Boot Camp... if you really need XP.

 

[lexus]

Dont worry you will have all your data still.

 

[LittleJoe]

Dont worry you will have all your data still.

Im in the middle of reinstalling OSX... the odd thing was that the partition i had originally put aside for windows had abut 4 gigs of used disc space... and my machd still had the same amount as it originally had.

So did I actually install it on the right partition? When I started the computer though it would boot straight into windows. So I dunno... kind of confusing. The install should be done in a few mins though... I guess well see.

 

[Abulia]

You may be formatting for no reason.

By default, when you install Boot Camp and Windows, the default OS is Windows. (Strange, I know.)

Did you ever hold down the ALT key at boot to see the bootloader and make sure OS X was there?

 

[LittleJoe]

You may be formatting for no reason.

By default, when you install Boot Camp and Windows, the default OS is Windows. (Strange, I know.)

Did you ever hold down the ALT key at boot to see the bootloader and make sure OS X was there?

Oy... the woes of a switcher. I ended up just choosing the "upgrade" option to play it safe. And ive got OSX booted up identically as it as before. And what do you know... there sits UNTITLED (drive) on my desktop with all the windows files.

what a noob. ok.... so alt key HAS to be pressed to choose the os when booting? ok... lets reboot and see if bootcamp will work.

 

[LittleJoe]

Thank you my friends... everything works peachy now. I guess I spent the pas two hours learning how to press ALT on start up

 

[etoiles]

...and remember that system preferences lets you define which OS loads up by default