Well, I've mostly convinced my parents to allow me to install linux as a dual boot on my main computer... and since I still have some chores to get out of the way, I'd just like to check a few things.

First, how many options will I have with the hard drive install? Here's my current setup:

1)mostly filled NTFS drive, w/ one installation of Windows XP
2)completely clean (freshly formatted) FAT32 drive

I'd like to use about 10 gigs or so of my blank drive for the linux installation and leave the rest of it for other files... Should I partition the drive before installation?

Also, I read somewhere that Mandrake does a terrible job of ATI video card installation. Since I have an OE ATI Rage 128 Pro GL AGP card this might affect me??

Thanks for your help,
Tom

Do you have two harddrives, one with NTFS and one with FAT32, or just two partitions? There is a partition page in Mandrake and you can do custom disk partitioning. The custom is pretty easy though. Also, check ATI's website and see if they have linux drivers.

2 seperate hard drives but I'd like to just partition one of them.

Hi Whoistom

Just an idea - but how about :

1st hard drive on Primary Master with 2 partitions.

1st partition - - Main NTFS partition for the XP install

2nd partition - - A FAT32 partition to use as a shared data partition - both Windows and Linux will be able to read/write to/from this partition.


2nd Hard Drive - on Primary Slave for the Linux install.

Personally - I wouldn't partition the Linux drive in advance - I'd just use the partitioning tools on disc 1 of your Linux distribution (assuming your going to use a Major distro like Mandrake or Red Hat?)

The best way for a new Linux user is to have some completely free space for which the Linux distribution can automatically install into.

You'll need a Linux filesystem to install the Linux distro onto - so - use disc 1 of your Linux distro to delete the FAT32 partition you've got on your new drive - and then let Linux install itself automatically in the resulting free space.

You can always re-size the Root partition to enable you to come back down to 10 gigs.

a typical basic Linux partition set up would be

Boot
Root
Swap

partitions - this is fine for a new Linux user.

any chance i could just make the FAT32 shared data partition on the 2nd drive? I don't have a plethora of space on my main drive.

Would XP be able to access it there?

uh... yeah i think so, why not?