Hi guys, it's me again, i'm still trying to install linux.

i have a 60GB hard drive. i installed windows XP on 50GB, leaving 10GB of free space for linux (good math eh?!). however, when i was installing linux, every time i try to make a third partition, for example, /boot, i get the msg "Cannot Allocate Required Partition".

the thing is that i need to make 3 partitions at least: /, /boot and swap. but no matter what order i try to make them in, i cant make the third one?! what the heck could the problem be??

Can anyone please help me?

What utility if any are you using to partition the 10 gig space? Depending on your distribution, you could probably get away with only a / and /swap if you're using a new enough version of LILO. What distribution is it you have? If you are setting them up incorrectly, that can cause problems obviously, such as not setting the /boot partition bootable, or not formatting them as ext2 or ext3 if newer. The logical order I think is /boot, /, /swap. It'll ne easier to know what's up with a little more info. Can you boot at all, questions above etc...

D'oh, sorry, i'm tired, i see it's red hat 7.2. Easily capable of booting without a /boot partition. Try with the two, just a root and swap.

darn! it still doesnt seem to work. linux just doesnt want me to use it!

i made the two partitions: / and swap, and start installing. but it stops every time it goes to the formatting and installing part (where u see progress bars and time remaining etc.). the whole thing just stops and i have to reboot my computer using the switch (no, ctrl+alt+del dont work either)!

When I was installing RH, it also appeared to lock up, but it really didn't. It was verifying the disk, and appears to do so in a noninteractive loop. I just waited about 30 minutes and it continued installing (I only had a 1.2 GB harddrive too so for you it may take a bit longer). If you have the verify disk option enabled, you might want to try turning that off.

and where do i turn that off?

I can't remember exactly when the installer asked that (I was installing RH7.0). But it did ask me directly if I wanted it to verify the disk after formatting. I also chose to use Disk Druid, I don't know if that had anything to do with it.

thks a lot. i'll try again (hope it'll work...)