help with Boot camp & Parallels

Ok guys sorry if this has been asked or not but i am a new MBP owner and need Xp for Autocad, Revit, etc and once in a while a game or so, question is can i have a boot camp install of Xp, which i own a full version licensed install it, be able to use it as a solo OS, but also have the option that if i'm in OSX being able to use windows using Parallels 5 (which i own also) for a quick file program without the rebooting. I tried reading the Parallels 5 user guide but it has so much mambo jumbo words that i don't understand bcuz i know nothing about virtual systems etc! Can this be done, is it easy and will both systems work for one copy of XP so i don't have to install programs twice.... meaning will Parallels program actually access my boot camp XP files? Hope all this makes some kind of sense, Is there an easy walk thru guide for a novice Thank you!!!

For AutoCad and games, you will definitely need to setup a Boot Camp partition and install Windows XP to run natively. Of course that means rebooting the machine each time. That's really not a big deal, I do it all time to run Windows 7.

As for Parallels, the answer is yes. Parallels will "see" your Boot Camp partition and offer to use it as a Virtual Machine. That way you will not have to activate XP twice nor install programs twice.

Regards.