Installed in root, want second in subdirectory

Question

Current situation

I am trying to plan ahead and avoid any grievous pitfalls and/or headaches in adding a second domain/site for a client.

1. WP is currently installed in root
2. The client wants a second site created for a new brand that may end up as it's own entity, so separate public facing domains.
3. The root site already has almost 200 pages + posts
4. I'd like to keep a central user base if possible.
5. They have quite a few plugins running
6. I use IWP, so keeping track of updates and backups really isn't that difficult.

Question(s)

1. Is it possible to create a subdir install with a separate domain pointing at it (with out moving the first install to it's own subdir)?
2. Would it be more beneficial to convert to a multisite install instead?

Answer 1

It can be done, I did it here for example:

http://krimsonkloverdev.malbert.me/ - dev site with seperate wordpress install http://www.malbert.me/ - main site on root level.

I set everything up at my host, I'd recommend you just contact them first and be sure you can have separate database installs as that's basically all you need.