I got redhat 9
Now how should I install it (Graphical or Text) what ies easier?
Lol, I will ask a lot because I don’t want to loose my WinXP, I got really scared, many ppl have lost their XP while trying to install linux

Graphical, definately.

Well, a graphical install is definitely easier, especially if you're coming from Windows.
Assuming that you have sufficient free, unformatted disk space, you don't have to worry much about wasting your Windows partition. You can install Linux there without even touching the Windows bit of your hard drive. The installer will prompt you repeatedly before actually creating and formatting partitions. Make sure you tell it to leave your Windows partition alone. Most people that **** up here, do so by not carefully reading the information on their screen, so just pay attention.

If Windows is currently taking up your entire hard drive, you will need to make room for Linux first though. A full graphical install of Redhat 9 (with Gnome and KDE) will typically require just over 2 GB, plus some extra room for your own data and anything you may choose to install later.
Windows XP normally uses the NTFS file system, and AFAIK the only way to resize an existing NTFS partition is using commercial tools such as Norton Ghost or Partition Magic. I'm no expert on either of those, so I can't help you there. Whatever you do, make sure you defrag your hard drive and back up any important data on your Windows drive first, so you can restore it if things should go horribly wrong somehow.

Working step by step

I choosed customized installation
I got to the partions part
I saw

Hard Drives
\/ dev/hda
Dev/hda1
\/ dev/hda2
Dev/hda5
Dev/hda6
Dev/hda7
Dev/hda8
FREE

All 1,5-8
Are ntfs
I want to install it on G:
I think its 8
I highlighted it
And click next
I got
You have not defined a root partition (/), which is required for installation of Lunix...

How to choose it?

Unless you're absolutely *sure* (rather than just "think") that hda8 is the drive you want to install to, I suggest you go back and find out.

If you have sufficient free space, I'd recommend installing there. Use automatic partitioning, and simply select "Keep all partitions and use existing free space". This is by far the safest way of installing Linux if you're an absolute newbie (no offense intended). The installer will automatically create the / (root), /boot and /swap partitions without hurting Windows. You can optionally review the partitions the Disk Druid is going to create before your disk is actually altered in any way.

You'll need at least two partitions, / and swap. You probably ought to delete /dev/hda8 and create two new partitions there, a new /dev/hda8 formatted with a Linux filesystem (ext3 works well) and a swap partition, /dev/hda9. This will destroy ALL the data on /dev/hda8, so make very sure that there's nothing you want to keep there.

If you're feeling very paranoid, make a full backup of your Windows system before trying to install Linux. Then you have some insurance in case something gets screwed up. Also, if you are going to start again, you probably should go for something more recent than the old RH9, which is unsupported except as a legacy product. The Fedora Core series is a continuation of the non-enterprise Red Hat stuff, so you might want to look at that.

how to find out?

MAIN PROBLEM:

Clicked automatic partioning and keep….
I only saw /hda in the box?? And it was ticked (shouldn’t I choose here where to put it)

Anyway I click next and I got 2 msgboxes
1-
Could not allocate requested partintions. Partitioning failed. Could not allocate partitions as primary partiotion.

2-
The following errors occurred with your partitioning:
You have not difined a root partiotion (/) which is required for installation of Redhat…
This can happenif there is not enough space on your hard drive(s) for the partiotiong
You can choose a different automatic partintioning or click back and choose maual

Btw, I have 14 GB free on my G:\ drive
I think I do have space?

To find out what's on G:\, go into Windows and look at it. As I posted above, you need to format the target partition with a Linux filesystem (ext3) and allocate a swap partition of Linux to use.

If you know windows better, it might be easier to remove your G: drive partition from windows. Just make sure there is nothing on G: that you need cause all data on G: will be lost.

To do this go to Control Panel->Administrative Tools->Computer Management.
Then expand the storage icon and click on "Disk Management", Click on G: drive and then click remove.

After the process is finished, you can go back to Redhat Installation and try the automatic installation.
If that does not work then you need to create 3 partitions manually ( according to the redhat documentation http://www.redhat.com/docs/manuals/l...KPARTRECOMMEND)
Start with the swap partition (this is similar to virtual memory in windows)
- Click the New button and in the type drop down box select swap
- Now specify the size of the swap partition. ( Usually twice the size of your RAM so If you have 256MB ram, them make the swap partition 512MB)
- Click OK ( not sure of the exact names, I'm using Mandrake)

Now you repeat the process to create a partition called "/boot" (don't include the inverted commas), this one only needs to be 100MB or so and will be of type ext3.


Now for the last one create a partition called "/" and specify that it should take up as much free space as possible. (Again I don't remember the exactly names of the options). This is also of type ext3.

Once this is done you can click next, and all should be well.

HTH
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