Hello from a Linux newbie in Singapore

I have 2 hard disk drives in my PC. One of them is installed with Windows XP and the other is not partitioned at all.

Drive 1: 40 GB (Single NTFS partition installed with Windows XP)
Drive 2: 60 GB (not partitioned)

I would like to install Red Hat Linux OS in Drive 2. Then when I boot from Windows XP, it will allow me to choose either to load Windows or Linux OS.

When I install the CD Rom and choose Disk Druid, I am brought to a screen which shows tables for the
partitions and drive summary. Both tables show my first drive. I am worried that if I continue with the install procedure Linux will partition Drive 1 and I will lose all my data or I won't be able to boot from Windows XP the next time?

How should I achieve my desired method of booting up?

Was wondering whether I can partition Drive 2 using Linux Fdisk (Ext2 partitions), create a rescue boot diskette for Linux and then boot from the Linux resdue diskette.

Next, run dd if=/dev/hdan of=/boot.xxxx bs=512 and then copy the boot.xxxx file into a DOS-formatted floppy.

Hopefully my Windows XP boots the next time and I copy the Linux file boot.xxxx into C:\, and append the string "c:\boot.xxxx="linux"" in boot.ini.

Does this mean that when XP boots the next time, and I choose Linux OS, Xp reads the boot.ini file and somehow understands is able to read the boot.xxxx file, look at the first sector of Drive 2 and load the Linux OS?

Let me know.
Thanks.
Anthony.

Perhaps, it's time for you to learn how to rescue XP.

# After you installed XP on /dev/hda1
# & Linux with lilo on /dev/hda2
#
# Replace /dev/hda2 if need be
#
Boot Linux & open terminal
mount /mnt/floppy
dd if=/dev/hda2 of=/mnt/floppy/boot.lnx bs=512 count=1
cp boot.lnx /mnt/floppy
umount /mnt/floppy
Boot XP
copy boot.lnx c:\
edit boot.ini
After multi(0)..., add a new line
C:\boot.lnx="linux"
Reboot