HI TO EVERYONE !
I have always been very found of pc and videogames and always been using microsoft oses since ms-dos 5.0 (1991 !) until 2005 when i dual booted win xp and mandrake 10.1,a fabulous os until the hard disks died...
Now i wish i could make a win xp/suse 10.2 dual boot but before installing i'd ask a little help from the community for not doing troubles,for work-i am a medical doctor-i need to use SPSS and SAS, medical databases similar to excel and running on win,the old versions i used on mandrake ran very very bad under wine so i HAVE TO KEEP WIN XP bootable without problems-and for games too...-
I have this pc now:
AMD 3500 64 BIT
ASUS A8N SLI DELUXE
2 GB RAM
GE FORCE 6600 GT
SOUND BLASTER LIVE 1024 24 BIT
3 SERIAL ATA HDS SO PARTITIONED:
-HD 1 200 GB: (NTFS )
1:WIN XP BOOT PARTITION OF 50 GB
2:NORTON GHOST IMAGES
3:GAMES
4:MASTERIZATION
5:RUBBISH
6:SWAP FILE

-HD 2 160 GB: (NTFS )

1OWNLOADS AND BACKUPS HD 2 PART 1
2OWNLOADS AND BACKUPS HD 2 PART 2
3OWNLOADS AND BACKUPS HD 2 PART 3


-HD 3 300 GB: (NTFS )

1OWNLODS AND BACKUPS HD 3 100 GB PART 1
2OWNLODS AND BACKUPS HD 3 80 GB PART 2

3:30 GB FAT 32 FOR SHARING FILES BETWEEN WIN AND LINUX
AND SO 70 GB OF FREE SPACE

I WISH I COULD INSTALL SUSE 10.2 WITH KDE AND GRUB ON THE 70 GB OF FREE SPACE OF HD 3 AND USE THE 30 GB FAT 32 FOR LINUX BOOT IMAGES FILES...

I AM RIGHT ?

SO HOW SHOULD BE GRUB MENU CONFIGURED TO BOOT WIN XP AS DEFAULY OS?I NEED TO KNOW IT TO AVOID EVENTUALLY BOOT WIN XP PROBLEMS..

PLEASE ANSWER ME,EVERYONE'S HELP IS VERY ,VERY WELCOMMED!

THANKS TO ALL YOU ! THIS FORUM IS FABOULOUS !

hi

it is good to see someone who appears to take backups seriously..sorry you think you have to stay with dual boot....you could be a candidate...with your intelligence...for a virtual machine

if you unfamilar with such beasts.....you would have either
ms...on hard drive....with a single file that you (kinda) boot into from ms....that is linux

or the of course the best action....linux installed with a single file that you boot into to get to your ms.

some emulator...virtual machines include vmware and qemu.

2) Can i suggest not using such large fonts in your next post if you post again...it is considered as SHOUTING and we can read.


3) suse or other main distros should be able to be installed as dual boot if that is what you prefer.

have a read of my tutorial if you wish to pursue grub...but suse or mandriva should be able to handle it.

in your terms....hd1 becomes hd0 with grub counting from zero

its master boot record would need to be overwritten with grub and grub can handle chainloading to ms or booting linux.

Alternatively you can keep ms bootloader and have it chainload to linux...but it is messy....included in my signature as well

good luck with linux.

correction ....I meant pls do not use capitals not large fonts.

2) In reply to your other enquiry....on my machine...suse is slower than mandriva.

you could test by downloading the opensuse live cd and comparing it to the mandriva one or mandriva metisse live cds.

3) suse tho...have a slightly faster update cycle of version numbers which means you may get a newer application and default kernel quicker with suse.

to be blunt...try mandriva if you have a bandwith problem in downloading

hi!

thank you aus9 !

ok,i have no bandwith problem 'cos a have a 4 mega adsl connection,anyway i'll try mandriva as you suggested..and let God be good !

i have used emulators,they're beasts with low performances-i still use microsoft virtual pc 2004 on win xp to paly old games win 98 only compatible an used vmware 5.5 to run ubuntu under win xp,ms virtual pc is good but vmware was shit and unistalled it-so i'll try install mandriva in natural dual boot and let you know how it goes.

thank you !

as we speak I am testing Mepis 6.5

so far its all good.

boot time is almost as fast.

codecs no probs.

installing debian style software no probs.

my knowledge of how to upgrade compile the kernel is the only thing at the moment holding me back.

its on my todo list....but if no bandwith probs I now suggest you have a look at the live cd Mepis 6.5 which is installable....which is how I am currently testing

hi !

ok..i'll download mepis 6.5 as soon as i can,test it and anyway wait for your rewiew before installing..let me know hot well it goes finally ! then i'll finally put linux on my pc ! even if i used mandrake i am in practice a newbie to linux and don't want to do troubles and spend ages in resolving boot problems...

thank you very much !

hmmm, well the way I test assumes some linux skills....so do not wait for me...and instead do whatever you think is reasonable.

You can read various reviews of most distros at

www.distrowatch.org

but if you are keen to learn from me....I recommend you keep a live cd such as mepis or knoppix for the application called partimage....which you could use to save and restore partitions.....acts like Nortons ghost.

hi 1

i knew of partimage,i used it to make root and home backup images on another hd..anyway,i'll listen to your suggestions and look all around and use live cd of course too..anyway,you are always very kind so if i should have any problrms i' d like to talk to you.

only a think:grub must be put on the mbr of the partition win xp is installed in,isn't it ?

as always thank you!

grub is preferred to be on the first detected drive by the bios to improve speed.

grub then is pointed to the booting files which could be on any of your drives.

Generally speaking ....you should have the most used operating system on the fastest drive.

As grub can trick ms into thinking its installed on C partition (when it is not) you can install ms to the slowest drive...if you prefer.....and have linux on the fastest.

but my advice is general and you are free to make your own decisions....I try to be blunt as I find most ms people just want simple directions.

hi !

thank you !

hi !

i followed your suggestions and your grub tutorials and installed kubuntu 7.04 in hard disk 3 and grub in hard disk 3 too...
now if i want to load linux i have to press f8 in post,select hard disk 3 and linux and voila...kubuntu loads without any problems !

by this way win xp is left virgin,no mbr overwriting,no boot problems,no boot failures...it loads very fast and well..

i made 4 partitions,1 for swap,1 for home,1 for root and 1 for temp this last formatted with fat32 for sharing files with win xp...i save boot backup images with partimage both in temp and home to restore them in case of problems...i have just now restored an image even if i had no problems just to see if it worked and it woreked as i expected...faboulous !

everithing goes perfectly...

i suggest to do this partitioning to everyone and with every distro too...i say it in another of my posts..

kubuntu has kernel 2.16.20 too,the last one done,which has an extension called kvm whick lets you install any other win or linux os directly under kubuntu without using vmvare or other similar beasts..and it gives you very much better performances than vmware or similar..i'll use it to install your same mepis 6.5 under kubuntu and give it a look..

thank you !

I do not want to dissuade you...but if you find a distro where everything is easy stay with it a bit longer so you can learn it.

as you seem to be happy with my advice now wander over and start to read from the security forum and of course I highly recommend the rootkit hunter here

http://wiki.linuxquestions.org/wiki/Rootkit_Hunter

no,sorry,i have not been clear...i don't want to change kubuntu with mepis or another one...i'll keep kubuntu on my hd till it dies and crashes to death....i'm very,very lazy..i'll only take a look to mepis to see how it goes,kubuntu is perfect for me and don't need to complicate my life losing time in installing hundreads of distros,i came back home almost at 21. everyday and at home i'm tired and all i need is getting some rest with my hobbies cos i have anyway also to study still for all my life a bit to keep me updated with my job...every doctor has to be always updated for not doing troubles...!...and kubuntu goes well,is easy to use,stable and ok..so i'll try to became as better as i can in using it and learn even the smallest secrets and tricks of this distro..

now i'll learn how to use the program you told me..


thank you !