I started to use Linux (precisely Mandrake 9.2) a few months ago, and already found it a really good OS. Now that I've tried Mandrake 10 beta and the new kernel, I 've decided to turn my HD upside down: I'll re-partition my HD, making my Linux partition a lot bigger, and leaving just a few gigas for Windows.

However, since re-partitioning is always dangerous, I guess I should make a backup of myu files, right? Both my win files and my Linux files. My Linux is partitioned like this: /, usr and home. So here are a few questions:

1- Reaprtitioning: which program should I use?
2- Can i resize partitions without losing the files stored in them?
3- My home partition is the last one on the partition table. How can I resize it if there is no more space to the right to expand it?
4- Any tips on how to backup my files? Which CD Burner do you suggest me to use?

Thanks...

1 - i partition my drive in windows using partition magic and there is Qt-parted for linux but i havent tried it yet.
2 - you shouldn't lose any file by using them but its always safer to backup.
3 - partition magic when u resize u specify to it to take free space from which partition and i dont know about qt-parted as i havent tried it.
4 - the best burner in linux is k3b and in win. nero IMO
and for backing up there is partimage in linux which is like norton ghost

I know in Windows, partition magic is good...although last time i tried to use it with LILO as my bootloader, i lost both OS's....it was rough...see if you can disable lilo and make it boot straight to windows if you use partition magic...then configure a bootloader again after the partitioning.

As far as a burner, are you asking about actual drives or the software? Software, i suggest Nero for windows, K3b for Linux (KDE).

The hardware, i have a cheap memorex 52x and it's done me no wrong yet...

haha, almost identical posts...interesting...one minute apart

yeah i was amazed too
its just these are the best and the most used

Thanks, guess I'll try partition magic.

Up to now, I was using Linux, but my home partition was almost empty. That's why I was keeping all my files (such as mp3s, movies, docs etc...) on a windows partition, since I could have acces to these files from both windows and Linux. If i start saving my files to a Linux partition, whenever I need to use Windows I won't have access to the files, right?

I'm not really willing to keep doing it because sooner or later things will get really confusing, and I really made up my mind on changing to Linux, but just out of curiosity, what do you guys think of this idea? Will it make things slower under Linux? Is there any work around the problem of opening Linux files under windows?

what you can do is have partition formatted in fat32/vfat. This is the filesystem that was used with win95/98 and can be accessed from both linux and windows w/o problems.

When you use partiton magic, just use it to shrink your windows partitons. Leave the rest of the disk empty and let your linux installer create the linux parititons.

there is a program called Explore2fs if u want to see ur linux dir in windows

http://uranus.it.swin.edu.au/~jn/linux/explore2fs.htm

Just a tip, the version of k3b that comes with mandrake 9.2 (v 0.9) gave me trouble importing past sessions and was kinda buggy BUT, just go to:
http://www.k3b.org/ in the download section, scroll down until you see a Mandrake 9.2 RPM and download it.
Next, uninstall the current k3b version from kde menu/configuration/packaging/remove software and then proceed to install the version you downloaded by typing:
rpm -ivh <package.rpm> in the directory you have the file or by double clicking on it on konqueror.
Last, go to kde menu/configuration/other/menuDrake and add an icon to the program because the one you used to had will be erased since you erased the package! I chose the same place for the icon. The command is just k3b since it'll be on you PATH variable.
0.11 is much better than 0.9 so I encourage you to upgrade ASAP!

I use the BootIt partition manager. It is good and it's free.

The idea of having a fat partition for Linux and Windows is interesting... but there is probably a downside to it, right? What exactly am I losing using FAT instead of ReiserFS?

fat defragments a lot more than the linux filesystems. it also does not have features like file ownerships and different permissions for different owners and such (b/c fat was not designed for a multi user OS). maybe it's also slower - don't know if it's going to be noticeable for home use, though.