Alienware AllPowerfull M17X and XP

Hello

NOTE : This is the new M17X (DELL) not the old m17x.

I really need to get XP going on a second partition and have some questions before I begin, that I was hoping some experts could help me with ?

PS Please don't just berate me for installing XP, I do prefer vista 64 and will use it almost exlcuisvely (until I install windwoss 7 that is), but I do need XP for some compatibility reasons.

I need to know what drivers I will need ? Although a complete set would be great, I could subsist on just those drivers that will make the system run, plus the 280M performance graphics drivers.

My specifics are :

2.93 Core 2 Duo
6GB DDR3 (will I need to disable any RAM or will XP just ignore the extra)
2 * 280M
17"
Panasonic Blueray (writer/reader)/ DVD/CD combo.
1TB RAID

I would like to continue to use RAID and only have a 100GB partition for XP.

Will a new version of XP have the required drivers for the hard drive/RAID or will I need to do something for this to work ?

One last question, if everything goes well and it all works, if at some time in the future I want to reset my system to its factory defaults (ie 1 PARTITION win 64 vista + factory software/drivers) will I be able to use the Alienrespawn DVD (I am guessing the Alienrespawn hard drive partition will be blown away during the formatting, so will the DVD still work to recover ? I do not care about using the first two options of restore only the complete factory reinstall).

Thankyou for your time

If you need more info please ask away.

 

Bump.

Someone anyone.

 

hey, I got it working about 2 months ago and made a thread as to how to do. about raid, I had to switch the mode to ata in the bios for the the setup to work.

 

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=424486

 

Thanks very much, don't know how I missed this. Thankyou again