I'm attempting dual boot of windows XP (primary partition) and Suse linux 10.0 (secondary partition). I have the since harddrive partition into 2 partitions.

I booted from the Suse CD 1 and got to the installation screen. How and where to I tell the installer to use the 2nd partition and not the first to prevent wiping out windows? Any help is appreciated?

There should be an option that asks you to format a hard drive. Choose that option and another to edit the "options" it gives you. You should put your installation on 'hdb' or 'sdb', if your drives are sata. 'hda' or 'sda' is usually where your windows files are on. I can provide more details and/or screenies when I get home (at work right now). Hope this is enough for you to get started. SuSE 10.0 is a graphical & interactive install, and is pretty straightforward. Just pay attention to and read all the options.

Later on, there will be an option asking where to put GRUB (bootloader). This will go into master boot record on windows partition/drive on first disk. That will enable you to boot both OSes.

If you are really nervous about installing SuSE and messing up the operation of windows, I would suggest taking the windows drive out and installing SuSe all by itself.

When you get to the partitioning stage, make sure to select "custom" partitioning instead of "use all of the disk". If you choose the latter, the installer will simply wipe out your windows and use all of the disk for Suse.

btw, you may want to use more than one partition for Suse. It is recommended to use a swap partition as well, unless you have a minimum of 2GB of RAM. And if you want to be sure your personal data are safe at all times, you can also make a third partition for you /home folder; if your system partition goes down for any reason, you can leave the home partition alone and reinstall only the system files.

SuSE 10.0 has a great installer. IMHO, if YOU do not have a lot of experience dual booting, A) Put YOUR boot information on a floppy drive disc to prevent writing to the hard drive any files that need to edited or moved around often. B) Try a small Hard Drive of 4-10 GB's. Try here........ http://www.pcsurplus online.com ............or................... http://www.outletpc.com These two offer shipping specials worth watching for. High quality and low prices too. I recommend using the second hard drive because it is so much better for the user to keep the files separate. After gaining experience, and working with the different "tools" to view, edit and move YOUR files, dual-booting has advantages. Good luck.