How to create Dual boot XP Pro and Linux

[Roger Redford]

Hi,

I have a computer running XP pro. It has two physical hard drives,
60 gig, and 120 gig. All use NTFS. The 120 gig is partitioned
into 90 gig and 30 gig.

Is it possible to install Linux on the 90 gig partition, and
have a dual boot computer? I only want to install and run
Linux on the second phyical hard drive.

Is there anything I will need to do with the file system?
Will Linux be able to access the other partitions, currently
used by XP?

Can anyone recommend any good web pages or FAQ on this?


Thanks

 

[Nick]

Get Partition Magic or another good partition software package. XP's boot
manager is only good for other MS systems.

 

[cursor101]

yeah when i installed linux (mandrake) it partitioned it
for me. fairly easy system to understand. just make sure
you don't ask it to do something stupid like format the
drive with XP. when you start it up after installation it
should bring up a gui prog called lilo that will ask you
if you want to run linux or windows. for more info go to
www.linuxiso.org and make sure you don't pay squat for
linux

 

[mjt]

Is it possible to install Linux on the 90 gig partition, and
have a dual boot computer?  

.... yes

Is there anything I will need to do with the file system?

..... you'll have to shrink the partition(s) to make room
for Linux style partitions

Will Linux be able to access the other partitions, currently
used by XP?

..... ntfs is read-only, fat32 can be read/write by Linux

Can anyone recommend any good web pages or FAQ on this?

http://www.linuxselfhelp.com/
..

 

[nobody]

: Hi,

: I have a computer running XP pro. It has two physical hard drives,
: 60 gig, and 120 gig. All use NTFS. The 120 gig is partitioned
: into 90 gig and 30 gig.

: Is it possible to install Linux on the 90 gig partition, and

Sure.

: have a dual boot computer? I only want to install and run
: Linux on the second phyical hard drive.

: Is there anything I will need to do with the file system?

Yup. Linux doesn't grok NTFS so you'll be reformatting that
partition into ext3 or whatnot.

: Will Linux be able to access the other partitions, currently
: used by XP?

See above. Sort of is the answer. read-only NTFS works pretty
well in Linux but don't even think about writing to it.

: Can anyone recommend any good web pages or FAQ on this?

It's in all sorts of places.
http://riki-lb1.vet.ohio-state.edu/mqlin/computec/software/ntlinux.dualboot.html
looks OK. This is very routine.

If you need to share files back and forth then you'll have
to find a common file system- ancient yucky FAT is OK though
it throws away much of your disk so you may want to create
a small partition for sharing. Or maybe look at ext2 since there's
a Windows driver for it.

Stan

 

[Roger Redford]

Sorry, I'm a newbie with dual boots.

The drive is already partitioned. Do I need to partition it again?
Could I use Fdisk? Do I need to create a boot manager?

I'm hoping to learn the whole procedure. Is there a website somewhere
to explain it all?

 

[Xyerp]

Hi,

I have a computer running XP pro. It has two physical hard drives,
60 gig, and 120 gig. All use NTFS. The 120 gig is partitioned
into 90 gig and 30 gig.

Is it possible to install Linux on the 90 gig partition, and
have a dual boot computer? I only want to install and run
Linux on the second phyical hard drive.

Yes, that is perfectly OK.

Is there anything I will need to do with the file system?
Will Linux be able to access the other partitions, currently
used by XP?

Indeed it will be able to access the other partitions, but take note
that the NTFS partitions should be considered as READ ONLY. You will
also want to make some additional partitions within your 90gb
partition, but your Linux distribution will guide you through this. In
essence you will need:

1. A partition for "swap space". Using Microsoft terminology, this is
a paging file - but rather than use a file it has its own partition. I
just make mine 1gb nowadays. People use all sorts of rules for swap
space - twice the memory installed and all that. Personally I think
these rules only applies when 1Gb of RAM was considered A LOT. There
is the thought that you want it at least as big as your installed RAM
so it can hold a full core dump. Again, my preference is to set
coredump size to 0 and just not care. So hey. Its just a number. Don't
make it too small and don't make it too big.

2. A partition to hold boot files (/boot) - I just make mine 100Mb,
and thats plenty.

3. Any number of partitions as you see fit, but as a minimum the root
partition (/). In Microsoft terminology, this would be C:\ - again,
personally, I only have 2 partitions here. The obligatory / and my own
/scratch. / will take up 90% of the remaining space, with /scratch
taking up the rest. But hey - thats me.

Oh, once you done all of that and its installed and everything, sling
yer hooks over here:

http://www.tldp.org

 

[Nick]

Sorry but I've only done it with 98 and XP. You need a third party boot
manager for non Microsoft operating systems. You buy these.

 

[Nick]

Whilst in XP you should use computer management for managing your partitions
instead of fdisk.

 

[James Keasley]

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Hash: SHA1

Sorry but I've only done it with 98 and XP. You need a third party boot
manager for non Microsoft operating systems. You buy these.

Nah, you just make sure you have a free partition on one of your harddrives
point the linux installer at it and Red Hat, Suse, mandrake etc will
sort the rest out for you automatically, no need to buy a commercial
bootloader or do any messy complex hacking about with stuff, unless you
want to

- --
James jamesk[at]homeric[dot]co[dot]uk

Imagine, if you will, someone typing on a keyboard whilst sipping and...
clearing the sinuses. -Torak on AFP
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[sqr]

Forget it and leave Linux alone 'cause it makes you stupid.

 

[Ed Murphy]

Forget it and leave Linux alone 'cause it makes you stupid.

Please do not feed the troll. Thank you, drive through.

 

[Alex Nichol]

Sorry, I'm a newbie with dual boots.

The drive is already partitioned. Do I need to partition it again?
Could I use Fdisk? Do I need to create a boot manager?

I would change the partitioning. Linux normally should use its own file
system - ext2 - not NTFS certainly and preferably not FAT. What I would
do is in XP - Control Panel - Admin Tools - Computer Management, select
Disk Management and look lower right for the graphic of the drive., then
r-click in that second partition, delete it, then r-click in the
resulting Unallocated space and create an *Extended* partition.

A Linux install will then make and format partitions for itself (you
will probably need a 'custom install' to be able to control it), within
that extended 'envelope'. And it will provide a boot manager/launcher
of its own, either lilo or more probably grub. You will need to tell
that, when you set it up, to include an entry for the partition where
Windows is. In setting up the Linux you might leave some spare space
in the extended partition (30 GB is very generous for it) and later make
a FAT 32 partition there, which you can do from XP's disk manager, and
use as a means of passing files from one system to the other.

 

[SD]

Hi,

I have a computer running XP pro. It has two physical hard drives,
60 gig, and 120 gig. All use NTFS. The 120 gig is partitioned
into 90 gig and 30 gig.

Is it possible to install Linux on the 90 gig partition, and
have a dual boot computer? I only want to install and run
Linux on the second phyical hard drive.

Is there anything I will need to do with the file system?
Will Linux be able to access the other partitions, currently
used by XP?

Can anyone recommend any good web pages or FAQ on this?


Thanks

Get MAndrake 9.1. It will resize your XP partitions for you
automatically. Don't forget to defrag first though. The MDK install is
simple and intuitive. Go for it! And just to be safe, install it on the
partition that doesnt have windows. As far as I know redhat doesnt
resize NTFS, but I might be wrong..

 

[Ori]

Sorry but I've only done it with 98 and XP. You need a third party boot
manager for non Microsoft operating systems. You buy these.

or use LILO/Grub...

 

[John Stumbles]

or use LILO/Grub...

Or small bootable FAT partition (assuming you want XP to be on NTFS) with
Win9x (assuming you have a <cough!> legit copy hanging around), NT boot.ini
multi-boot mechanism and loadlin to get into linux via 9x. Google
'multibooting solaris' for more info

 

[mjt]

Sorry but I've only done it with 98 and XP.  You need a third party boot
manager for non Microsoft operating systems.  You buy these

.... actually, the NT boot loader can boot Linux, but then
again, who would want THAT HAPPENING ??
...

 

[mjt]

Google 'multibooting solaris' for more info

.... solaris ?!?!?!??!? hey man, pass it around and put
a clip on it first
..

 

[Hector]

You may already have found the answer but, just in case, here's how I got my
Win2000, Linux and WinXP multi-boot. In my case, I installed Win2000 first,
then Linux and then WinXP on a spare partition.

To install Linux after Windows follow this steps, (borrowed from a Linux
forum)
Hope this helps.

***************************************With BOTH NT *and* Linux installed on
your hard disk, assuming LILO isinstalled in the boot sector of /dev/xxxx
.... Boot Linux using boot disk (logging in as root) Insert a
DOS-formatted floppy and mount it on /mnt # mount /dev/fd0 /mnt -t vfat
Create an image file of the /dev/xxxx boot sector # dd if=/dev/xxxx
of=/mnt/bootsect.lnx bs=512 count=1 in your case assuming boot sector is in
/hda5 # dd if=/dev/hda5 of=/mnt/bootsect.lnx bs=512 count=1
Unmount and eject the DOS floppy # umount /mnt Reboot into NT (Win2000)
Insert the DOS floppy and copy/drag A:\BOOTSECT.LNX to C:\ Add the
following line to C:\BOOT.INI boot selections C:\BOOTSECT.LNX="Linux"
Eject the floppy and reboot You should now have the option to boot into
Linux Note 1: You may have to remove the Read-Only attribute of BOOT.INI in
order to edit the contents. Please remember to restore that attribute. Note
2: BOOTSECT.LNX is specific to the location and size of the partition from
which it was created. If you relocate the partition or change size you will
have to create a new
BOOTSECT.LNX***************************************"John Stumbles"

 

[mjt]

You may already have

you're responding to the rwong sub-thread
..