b4 i install linux
 

hi guys,

this place is a haven, heaven.. everything when it comes to linux.. tis pretty clear with the number of members and posts it has!!

ok now to the chase,..

i have an IBM THinkpad laptop with intel mobile centrino 1.3Ghz, 256MB ram, 35GB hdd, ATI mobility radeon 7500 grafix card, dvd/cd-rw drive...

i have a single 35gb partition and i cant do anything to it...

i have XP in it... i want to install linux too (work demands it)

i cant repartition into 2 (some work specific reasons)...

ive been told that i can still install linux in the same partition with dual boot along with XP there...

can u guys tell me the steps involved and which is the best distro... im looking at either RHL9 or FC3...

im a total noob in installing linux... help me out...

the specs are given so that u guys can tell me which distro will be most suitable and will detect all hardware... btw i have some wireless stuff too coz mine is mobile centrino...

thanx guys

you can't install linux in the same partition, it's not possible. some distro's used to attempt this, but it faded away, as the performance is pretty poor compared to a real install. what you can do is use a cd based distro like Knoppix, which can save user data to that windows partition (FAT32 only) so you can effectively run it as a full blown system.

Distro makes next to no difference in terms of compatibility. I would use something recent, (no way in hell is that RH9, that is years old), but Fedora 3, Suse, Mandrake, Debian, Slack, Gentoo etc all are cool. You should look here , and see if your hardware is ok with linux. I have a thinkpad slightly older than yours with DVD, and it is cool with debian, including the wireless card. Wireless can be tricky though, and I wouldn't suggest debian as a first install, unless you don't mind doing much work to get started.

Distrobutions of linux are more like personalities, if you don't like it, try another. There is no right or wrong choices. I suggest only recent distros because then you have a good chance of the necessary drivers being included with it.

Peace,
JimBass