alright, so im a linux noobie, and here is my situation:

i have windows xp installed on a 40 gb harddrive that came with the computer, and have an 80 gb harddrive that is the slave (using cable select and is formatted NTFS)..i have the $$$ to get a separate hard drive because i want to install mandrake linux (it is going to be 120 gb)...

my general idea is to leave about 40 gigs for mandrake on the new harddrive, (but it is going to be another master hard drive via cable select) and i want to leave the other 80 gigs for shared space between windows xp + mandrake

my questions are:
1) after i get the hard drive recognized by windows, what is the process of installing mandrake 10 on the other hard drive?
2) i understand there are several boot managers...im looking for something that will give me an indication whenever i boot of which os i want to load...how would i go about doing this? is this included in the mandrake installation?
3) would the boot loader modify the boot record on the windows hard drive or the linux hard drive? and if so, would i have to change which harddrive it boots too in the BIOS?
4) will the fact that the harddrive im installing on is another master hard drive going to make a difference in installation and installing the boot loader?
5) since i have all my music stored on the 80 gb hard drive that is formatted NTFS...will i be able to play the mp3s in kde on mandrake? if not, would i have to transfer all my music to the other harddrive and format it the old one as FAT32 then transfer them all back?

thank you so much!

Hi there!

I pressume you're using ATA (IDE) drives rather than SCSI. Just as a note: While cable select can work fine, setting your jumpers to "Master" and "Slave" respectively is a much better method.
Are you installing your third hard drive on a second IDE cable and is there already a drive attached to it (CD ROM)? Please note that performance will only be as good as the slower drive on that chain.

my questions are:
1) after i get the hard drive recognized by windows, what is the process of installing mandrake 10 on the other hard drive?

Mandrake will mount it as hdc. Use expert mode in Mandrake to set up your paritions for hard drive #3.

2) i understand there are several boot managers...im looking for something that will give me an indication whenever i boot of which os i want to load...how would i go about doing this? is this included in the mandrake installation?

How do you mean "indication whenever I boot of which os"? A bootloader's job is to give you the selection of available systems, the actual booting is then initiated by the NTLDR (Windows) or by Linux.
I use the GRUB (GRand Unified Bootloader) bootloader rather than LILO because it's more flexible and easy to configure. Mandrake will give you the option of either GRUB or LILO (LInux LOader).

3) would the boot loader modify the boot record on the windows hard drive or the linux hard drive? and if so, would i have to change which harddrive it boots too in the BIOS?

If you install the bootloader in MBR of the first hard drive, then yes, it will alter that part. But it's not a problem. If you don't want this to happen, you can install the bootloader in the boot or root partition of Mandrake, but you'll need to create a boot floppy to get into Mandrake.
Or you can install the bootloader in the first sector of drive 3 and set your BIOS to see this drive as the first bootable device.

4) will the fact that the harddrive im installing on is another master hard drive going to make a difference in installation and installing the boot loader?

I'm not sure on this point as I've never tried to run three hard drives. But if hard drive #3 is on the same IDE cable as your CD-ROM, you might have to set it up as the slave drive of the secondary chain.

5) since i have all my music stored on the 80 gb hard drive that is formatted NTFS...will i be able to play the mp3s in kde on mandrake? if not, would i have to transfer all my music to the other harddrive and format it the old one as FAT32 then transfer them all back?

You'll be able to access your NTFS partitions from Linux. However, I don't know if Mandrake will mount your Windows partitions at install. Otherwise you'll have to set your mount points for your Windows partitions after install.
And yes, you can play back all your MP3s on a NTFS in Linux.

Terri

5) since i have all my music stored on the 80 gb hard drive that is formatted NTFS...will i be
able to play the mp3s in kde on mandrake? if not, would i have to transfer all my music to the
other harddrive and format it the old one as FAT32 then transfer them all back?

You'll be able to access your NTFS partitions from Linux. However, I don't know if Mandrake
will mount your Windows partitions at install. Otherwise you'll have to set your mount points
for your Windows partitions after install.And yes, you can play back all your MP3s on a NTFS
in Linux.

Mandrake should mount window$ partition at install, if not add windows drive to /etc/fstab or run: mkdir /home/roccoisskad/mnt and then simply run command:
mount dev/whichever_is_window$_hd? /home/roccoisskad/mnt. I am not sure as of yet that we can write to NTFS drives but be sure to install "progntfs". It is included on the powerpack CDs or you can download it from mandrakeclub.com "urpmi ntfsprogs". Good luck