Bootcamp Question:  External HD

First off, my hats off to the Mac community. I'm a recent convert from PC to Mac.
Here is what I want to do, and tell me if its possible. I want to use Bootcamp to get Windows XP on my computer in order to run alot of the windows software that I cant live without and simply dont have the money to buy the mac versions.
I DO NOT want Windows anywhere near my internal harddrive. SO I went out and bought a 1TB harddrive. I want to put the Windows OS on that harddrive and keep my Snow leopard on my internal HD. When I start the bootcamp application it does not give me the option to apply the windows operating system to the new harddrive...it only gives me the option to put it on my INTERNAL harddrive. I dont want to do this at all. IS there anyway to keep the different operating systems seperate? Thanks.

"As a side note: I've already tried Bootcamp with W7 which works (install same way as with Vista), but could not get the wireless keyboard to work."
Huh.. I use VMware Fusion to run W7 (it is pretty slow, but I only use it for poker sites) and the wireless keyboard works fine. It IS the older keyboard with the clear plastic base, perhaps that is the difference? Or is it the virtual windows? As I type I think I answered my own stupid question. Mac OS is still running the hardware with the virtual windows running.
Anyway. It's a possible solution. Use VMware Fusion.
I was going to do the bootcamp, but it wouldn't partition the hd because apparantly the physical space on the hard drive that would be partitioned is being used by files that can't be moved. It makes sense that the entire NTFS partition needs to be together physically. My computer is telling me I need to do a clean install of OSX and then try bootcamp again.
My question is... If I back up using Time Machine and then do the bootcamp to install W7, can I then just restore the backup onto the smaller partition? Or does Time Machine want to put stuff back into the same physical address on the harddrive?

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    Message was edited by: tjk

  • Another bootcamp and external monitor question

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    Message was edited by: ventidog

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    Hi,
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