I am upgrading my hardware in 6-8 weeks. Since I'll be reinstalling OS, I want to switch back to Linux from Windows. In advance, I've been switching over to packages like inkscape, gimp, that run on both platforms, and dumping things like photoshop. Still, there are a few things I may need Windows for. So I'm considering a dual boot or emulation.

I have not used WINE for a very long time. Back in the day, I think I only fooled around with it and then put it away. So I actually don't remember how it simulates Windows. Do I install Win7 into a partition and then point WINE at it?

If I go for a dual boot, what are the considerations? I have had that foul up on me many times in the past, and ended up having to fiddle around with booting off pen drives, or live distos, to install GRUB again and get to my data.

wine does not require a functioning windows installation to operate, it is merely an implementation of the windows API for Linux, albeit not a fully complete implementation

as for whether or not to dual boot, that depends on one of two things
1) do the windows based utilities work with wine (there is a page you can check that)
2) how prodessor/graphics intensive are the programs

perhaps you can get by running windows in a virtual machine like virtualbox.
but if you do dual boot, remember to install windows first then linux or you'll have the 'pleasure' of reinstalling your linux boot loader from a rescue cd or live cd.

I'm fairly certainly you can't run an entire Windows installation under Wine. If you want to be able to run Windows 7 at the same time you're running Linux then you install Windows 7 in a Virtual machine (Try VirtualBox).

If you're going to dual boot then install Windows first then Linux. If you do it in that order grub should sort everything out automatically. If you install Linux then Windows, Windows will wipe out grub and you'll have to muck around sorting that out.

Dear Friend
None to the above actually. Wine is used for enabling the use of windows applications under a Linux environment. Therefore you do not need to point wine to windows... Setup the distro of your choice, install wine from the repository in case you require the use of any windows software or use if applicable counterpart linux applications
If you still require a Windows 7 OS install then the options you have is dual booting, or virtualization through VirtualBox, Qemu or VMWare
Hope that helps

+1 to Gmamakis comments. I personally run virtualbox session and fully emulate windows without having to reboot. Dont expect to be doing any gaming, but you do not have to worry about wine supporting whatever proggies you want to run.

I would recommend that you do not dual-boot and try Wine first. It's not an emulator, and nor does it need a WIndows installation. It simply sits between the Windows application and Linux, translating Windows-specific calls into Linux calls.

If that doesn't work, then I think that installing Windows under a virtual machine (such as VirtualBox) in Linux would be a better idea than dual booting. That way, you don't risk any data, and you don't need to leave Linux to use Windows.

Many newer processors support "hardware virtualization" (Intel calls it VT-x, AMD calls it AMD-V), which means that instead of having to emulate the virtual machine's CPU in software (this is very slow), the guest OS can run right on your CPU.

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I too am a big fan of modern systems running a free virtual machine. Simple and easy as it gets to me at least.

I've found that so many of my programs do not work well with linux that it seems a lot more convenient (albeit more expensive) to dual-boot. If you don't have specialized windows applications, then all-Linux would be best!

Those would be programs that are written for Windows and thus there is no reason to expect to be able to run them on Linux, right?

Not to de-rail the thread with questions, But I feel they may have relevancy:

The OP mentions WIN7, and as far as I know, WINE behaves as XP, Would that cause the OP any issues?

Where is the site that list programs known to run with WINE?

And would using a certain distro have an affect on how the OP could run WINE?

run winecfg, you can set wine to behave like win 7

http://appdb.winehq.org/

not that i'm aware of other then the version of wine that ships with the given distro

One can still try the good commercial app from codeweavers.

Dunno how well a app may run in ReactOS.

Wow! Lots of helpful suggestions.

With Virtual Box, or similar, does it use the Windows registry for whatever Windows implementation it is pointed at? Of course, applications could be set up in Windows. What about setting up applications under Virtual Box? i.e. once you install Windows, you can install subsequent applications from Virtual Box under Windows, and have Windows applications

virtualbox is what is commonly referred to as a virtual machine, it is to all intents and purposes a separate computer (except it is software running under linux instead of hardware), you would create a virtual hard drive in virtualbox, install a copy of windows as if you were installing it on a real computer, then install your software, again as if you were installing it on a real computer, the operating system and software then function as if it were a real computer.

in this case, linux would run a copy of virtualbox, therefore it would be referred to as the 'host' os and virtualbox would then run a full instance of windows, which is referred to as the 'guest' os, but as far as windows is concerned it is the only os running and can't see the host os.

It looks like you don't have any clue about what a virtual machine is. It's a full PC (CPU, RAM, motherboard, drives, graphics card, monitor, etc.) emulated in software. You install an OS on it just like you would on a physical PC.