installing mandrake 9.1 in seperate hardrive
 

I have windows xp on primary drive of ide0. I am not sure about windows xp compatibility with linex, so I want to install 8.1 on a seperate drive. I have GA7-dxr mobo with 2 promise 100 ata slots. What is the best way to set this up so I have some sort of boot manager to select either os on start up? Ive tried looking at past posts and most (all) related to this concern are pre winxp
Thanks in advance for any help.

ok here's what I would do. When you install Linux i would change the jumpers so that the linux drive is the primary master and windows the primary slave. Then put in your linux installation cds. Make sure linux installs to the primary hard drive (hda). To be safe make a linux boot disc when it gives you the chance.

Then once you've done that you have two choices. You can either use the win xp boot manager to choose your os or the linux boot manager to choose your os.

Thanks Scotty
That sounds simple enough, Would you have any preference to which boot manager , Linux or XP? Which is the easiest to configure? Im a classic newbe with linux, but Im really looking forward to playing with it. As I mentioned, I have actually 4 ide with this mobo, if i configure the raid (ide 3, 4) as promise ata100. Is there any advantage in having the drives on seperate ide?
GA7-dxr
1700 athlon xp
2x20 gb 7200 ata 100 hd
lp52x cd-rom
lite-on 24-10-40 cd-rw
Nvidea tnt2 32 64m video
256 2100 ddr ram

Ive also heard its a real horror story trying to get a nvidea card working in linux. After the simplicity of windows, especially xp, Im a bit nervous about screwing something up royally when I start playing with mandrake. Right now im just reading everything I can find about it, so I might find it a bit easier.
Again, thanks for the help