Can I externally attach an old XP hard drive to my Vista laptop?

[luckyjimm]

Ah, I've got it to work now - it's recognised the drive and I've got the directory tree. But I can't get into the documents and settings folders, which is where everything is. It says "you don't currently have permission to access this folder". But I never set up any passwords on the old harddrive! Any idea how I sort this out?