Thanks, Eugenio.  If by chance you look over in the winxp.general forum, you
might find a post of about one week back wherein I asked about using a VM to
install and run VS, which was what I thought would be the best way as well.
Problem is, you have to install a separate WinXP OS on the VM to do that, a
new purchase copy of the software.  That is not an option for me, I cannot
afford to buy a full version of XP Pro at hundreds of dollars just to put VS
or anything else on a virtual machine.  I have Ubuntu Linux installed on a
VM in a separate parttion on the external drive, but that was free software.
So forget the VM I guess, although I agree it is the best way to do this
type of thing.  I am just doing this on my home PC for my own entertainment
so to speak, not for a business or commercial purpose.

But since you say you can install the full VS on an external HDD, maybe I
will try that in another partition, because I have gigs galore of free space
on my external drive so it will be no problem.  I just wanted to be sure it
would not screw up anything already installed.  I like the online
environment of VS Express and a lot of the other stuff in VSX too, so I want
to keep that around.  But I also want to explore the full version just to
see what is different or what added functionality it provides.

So thanks again....