Ok, Im a completely new at this. I got Partition Magic and when i went to use it i got this error: The selected disk has one or move partitions that can not be removed. So i got VMware Worrkshop. I Set up a new Virtual machene for Mandrake Linux. I went to run it and it said something about a boot disk. First of all with would be the best version of linux for my system, and why wont Partition Magic work. My system Specs are below



Processor
Model : Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 3.60GHz
Speed : 3.59GHz
Performance Rating : PR3950 (estimated)
Type : Standard
L2 On-board Cache : 1MB ECC Synchronous, ATC, 8-way set, 64 byte line size, 2 lines per sector

Mainboard
Bus(es) : X-Bus PCI PCIe USB FireWire/1394 i2c/SMBus
MP Support : 1 CPU(s)
MP APIC : No
System BIOS : Dell Inc. A02
System : Dell Inc. Dimension 8400
Mainboard : Dell Inc. 0J3492
Total Memory : 2GB DDR2-SDRAM

Chipset 1
Model : Dell Computer Corp 925x Memory Controller Hub
Front Side Bus Speed : 4x 200MHz (800MHz data rate)
Total Memory : 2GB DDR2-SDRAM

Video System
Monitor/Panel : Plug and Play Monitor
Monitor/Panel : Plug and Play Monitor
Adapter : RADEON X300 Series
Adapter : RADEON X300 Series Secondary

Physical Storage Devices
Removable Drive : Floppy disk drive
Hard Disk : ARRAY
CD-ROM/DVD : Philips DVD+RW DVD8601 (CD 40X Rd, 40X Wr) (DVD 5X Rd)
CD-ROM/DVD : SONY CD-RW CRX216E (CD 12X Rd, 32X Wr)

Logical Storage Devices
1.44MB 3.5" (A : N/A
Hard Disk (C : 741GB (659GB, 89% Free Space) (NTFS)
CD-ROM/DVD (D : N/A
Thefrozenthrone (E : 481MB (CDFS)

MultiMedia Device(s)
Device : Creative Audigy Audio Processor (WDM)
Device : ATI eHomeWonder, WDM Video CODEC
Device : SoundMAX Integrated Digital Audio

Operating System(s)
Windows System : Microsoft Windows XP/2002 Professional (Win32 x86) 5.01.2600 (Service Pack 2)

Network Services
Adapter : Broadcom NetXtreme 57xx Gigabit Controller

Possibly because it's an array of disks, and Partition Magic is more geared to systems that only have one disk. You might want to download and burn a regular mandrake install cd, and use it's install to partition. Still, depending on how your disks are arrayed, it probably won't work. My suggestion would be to save your time and money, add another disk (outside of the array), and install Linux there.

The problem is that arrays, by definition, have information spread all across the disks, which makes splitting them into sections a hellish problem. Ideally you want to be able to entirely separate disks into different parts. This also protects you in the long run, in case MS gets cute and adds something to their OS that looks for Linux and overwrites it.

If you ever reinstall your MS system (which tends to be typical for most windows users), the next time you do it, you may want to check the jumpers on the back of the drives, adjust them from CS (or similar) to master/slave configurations, and adjust the bios (if necessary).

It might mean looking at the drives as separate drives, but on the upside, you will be able to more finely tune your system. In some ways, it's safer, because you can place your OS on one drive, and your information on another, so when you do have to fix Windows, you don't have to rebuild everything.

If you're installing Mandrake, as I understand you are, it will resize your partition for you and create a new MBR.

MBR?, is Mandrake installed then, or is it justed portioned for an install?

Only you can answer that question..

i dont know mandrake but u can use linux to create the partitions u need. u need at least 2 for linux. one u name / and another u have to partition as swap with about 2x ram size.
mbr means master boot record.
but u should be aware that there might be some losses of data on the C-drive if u format parts of it as reiserfs or ext2 for linux cause windows file system is sort of halfwit.
good look + welcome!