OK, I'm making the switch over to Linux (want to learn the kernel) but I want to continue running Windows on my machine. The catch is, I wanted to run it on an external hard drive. Based on what I've read, the windows boot files can't be placed on an external without royally screwing up. So, I thought that if I left the system files in a small partition on my original hard drive and moved everything else over to the external I would be fine. Does anyone know if this is possible?

should be possible, keep the windows folder, system information folder, and some program files/folder (reference assemplies and othen windows' specific folder.)

If you want free space on your internal hdd you could also put even the swap file on the external drive and you must remember everytime you install a new software to use a custom path (the default is always on C).

It's a big pain.

Also new version of Windows are everytime more big so if you later would like doing an update probably the space that you have reserved will be insufficient.

In summary there are many problems, are you sure you like dueling with them?

Windows isn't a system much flexible so is always a big pain make choices that go against its nature.

like you can't resize the boot partition, or a partition which has the system information. you can't really control the install.

Yes it is not only possible I have done it on several machines. Since window$ is the hog you <i>MUST<i/> load it first. Then use a partitioning tool such as Qparted or something like it. Don't use the window$ partitioning tool. Then you can use fdisk (Cmd line tool)to size the partition if you can't get it under parted or Qparted ( a regular tool in linux I just use the Knoppix disk & fdisk. Once you have the partition sized ( I managed to get Windows XP-Pro to run in a little bitty box of around 26GB, it almost ran in 24G but no luck. Then you can load Linux, the distro will usually show you what you have to work with. Be sure to remember that the smaller the win partition the more likely you must save data off the system. Good Luck and let us know how it turns out.
In Service & In Health,
Captain Cautious