I bought the Thinkpad T41 (2373-2FG/ TC12FUK) just yesterday. At present trying to get to know the difference between the new laptop and the T21 I was using for the last 3 years. Not having any problems as far as hardware is concerned.

I am basically interested in a dual boot with Windoze XP and Red Hat 9. I noticed that the hard disk is configured with only a C drive and that hidden partition having all the software (which I do not want to loose). How would one go about repartitioning the disk and also not loose the hidden partition at the same time?

I did a search for the T41 and found a few threads with useful information however the partitioning information was not there. Those who are using the T41 may have gone through the same process. If there is any thread or link I would appreciate if I am guided about it.

Any other info if anyone can share would also be greatly appreciated.

Moved: This thread is more suitable in Laptops & Handhelds and has been moved accordingly to help your thread/question get the exposure it deserves.

Thanks for being considerate, will wait patiently for any responses.

You may want to check here: http://www.linux-on-laptops.com/ibm.html

I suspect that most of the T40 information would still be applicable to the T41. Sounds like you should pick up the recovery disk if you haven't already. Good luck with the project. -- J.W.

i got myself the recovery cd from ibm and used fdisk to clear all my partition just to recover the hidden partition... but before that, you have to make the partition visible by going into bios and "make it visible".... then i reinstall XP with the recovery cd...
i suspect that i do not need to do a fdisk instead, just go ahead with the bios setting and use either parted or partition magic to make use the space of the hidden partition... if you happen to try it, please post me the result... thanks!

Thanks for all the help. I have ordered the CD's through the IBM's local distributor and as soon as I have them with me I will give it a try. After the attempt will post the results as requested.

Partition Magic is tour solution. If you run the partition magic you would see only 36GB of your really 40GB space in your hardr drive because the hidden partition has 4 Gb aprox.
The partition Magic doesn't use that hidden partition so you would not have any problems with that
Make so many changes as you want , always if the partition is hidden.

bye

Sorry -- Delayed responce.

I'm convinced the best way to set up linux on a T41 is to use a USB2 External hard drive. I'm having fun finding a distro that works, but would be happy to work with you as i get my compute set up so it will boot to Windows XP when there is NO USB drive attached, and boot into Linux when a USB drive is attached. (setting the bios to boot order 1. SlimDrive CD/DVD 2. USB HDD 3. internal HDD was a piece of cake.

Ironically - my computer will ONLY boot up from the USB drive, as i managed to mangle the MBR on the main drive -- took me half a day to get LILO from mandrake to fix the mess i made attempting to install SuSe, so i could boot into windows at all.

Both flavours detected the USB Drive just fine, and installed the OS, however both os's result in the same Kernel Pannic - which is reported on many different websites, however- reported in language i don't understand.

i'd be interested in your success stories, and i'll post my own.

ken

I just got my T41. I've just started prepping it for dual boot (XP/Pro & Red Hat 8.0).
I used Partition Magic to create a 50 Meg partition for BootMagic at the front of the drive, and shrunk the NTFS partition down to 30 GB, leaving me 30 GB for Linux.
All went smooth as silk. I did not worry about the PreDeskTop Area, and the Blue IBM key still brings up the same utilities menu as before. (Just to be on the safe side, I got a set of recovery CDs from IBM first. Free, and delivered in 2 days)
I plan to use Partition Magic to carve out the Linux main and swap partitions, and a 2 GB FAT partition to facilitate sharing files between XP & Linux.
Will keep the board posted on progress.

Bill

The partition is hidden in the setup menus. You can hide it or unhide it. If it is hidden, no amount of fdiking will kill it. If you unhide it, you can erase it. The predestop area is unaffected, but you will be unable to restore your drive to factory condition.

The restore CD's are able to recreate the windows install, but can't recreate the partition. I plan on making a ghost image of that partition just in case.

I have a T41p, and so far everything is going just fine with Arch 0.6.

question regarding the predesktop area?

when my T41 boots off a USB drive into linux (either Mandrake or SuSe) i get a kernel panic. Doesn't mater which bootloader i use - but each bootloader causes a different panic.

Currently using LILO Text i get:
I now have the IBM rescue CD's and plan to try deleting the predesktop partition, but has anyone else seen this problem when booting off a USB device, and also can anyone point me in a direction to a man page or help file to append the correct "root=" as i have no idea where to start to fix this. My hunch is that the "unknown block" is the predesktop area - and the bootloader has no idea what to do with it...

I can boot into Linux using the install CD's so i can (i believe) make changes and rebuild the kernel if need be, if not, i'm sure i can burn a full Distro onto CD to start my system... but i'm a relative newbe and this stuff -- so go slow and easy with me please... thanks.

The hope is to have a computer that is purely a Windows XP system with no USB drive attached, Allowing me to have an assortment of linux flavours simply by changing USB drives.

ken.

On my T41 install, there has been no joy with Red Hat 8.0.
I created new partitions with Partition Magic (ext3, swap and a FAT32 to share).
When I boot the RH8 CD, it finds no CDROMs or Hard Drives.
I've not been able to find any reports of this kind of problem, so I am obtaining CDs for RH9 and Fedora Core, and will try again.

Bill

Redhat Fedora Core found the internal hard drive and offered to install Redhat on the 3G partition that the predesktop area reserves for backup and recovery images. (I downloaded the latest version "IBM Rapid Restore Ultra 4.0" which allows me to save backups to a USB drive, instead of the hidden partition, although you have to perform a manual save. I've seen much better software for windows backup - ie. "Back Up For One" from Lockstep Systems Inc.)

Regardless, the only drives that Redhat did not offer to install linux on was the external USB Drive.

I have the T41, 2378-DLU (40GB Hitache Drive), hope that helps.

ken

Well, it turns out that having the machine in the docking station (using a KVM switch with my desktop) was a problem.
I took it out and ran on batteries, and RH8 installed OK. Except that BootMagic couldn't find the EXT3 partition. I ran Partition Magic and it says I messed up partition table and it won't let me fix it. I opened an issue with Symantec (new owners of PM - damn - Symantec is the Computer Associates of the PC world)

Bill

Has anyone had any trouble with the ATI Radeon cards in the T41? I have a T41 with the ATI 9000, and was wondering if anyone had any problems with the install, configuration etc.