best way to setup mambo, smf, etc. for testing

[NoRad]

I have an existing SMF, Coppermine, FlashChat setup.

I want to test Mambo + the above. Should I setup a new site with all of this for testing, and then after it's done testing I can simply switch over the database for the existing SMF site??

Also, do you guys recommend having Mambo in the root folder and SMF in a subfolder (ie. Forum), or mambo in a subfolder of the root like the forum is?

[tjay]

I have Mambo in the root, SMF is in a root folder called forum, Coppermine is in a root folder called photos.
All in the same database, www.cyprex.biz

By the way, I have not tested the bridge on it yet. But there is an excellent dev tool for Mambo sites called MSAS. or Mambo stand alone server. It can be downloaded here.
http://mamboforge.net/projects/msas/

it comes with a control panel for PHP and MySql. So my guess is you could set up coppermine and SMF to run on it as well.

[NoRad]

Interesting. I guess the other part of my question is still unanswered though. I wonder if I can just install the site to another virtual web and run it there for testing, but linking to the CURRENT databases, or if perhaps I should setup new databases and then when the testing is over - swap them out? =/