Want to install Win XP and Linux on same machine...

[Roots]

Hi, I want to have both Windows XP and Linux Redhat V 7. on my machine. Here is the system:

MSI 655 Max motherboard
PIV 2.4 Ghz 533Mhz FSB
512 MB PC3200 RAM (DDR 400)
Seagate 120 GB 7200 RPM HDD
ATI RADEON 9500 Pro
SB Live! 5.1
Samsung 12X DVD-ROM/40X CD-ROM

Alright, I have a few questions about how I should go about putting this system together...

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1. Should I partion my HDD, or should I buy a seperate one for the Linux OS? (I was thinking of buying a cheap 40GB HDD for Linux OS. I mainly only need Linux to conduct my research)

2. I know all of my hardware is supported under WinXP, but will they work for Linux also? Will I need to find/create special drivers for them to run properly under Linux?

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Thats all I can think of right now. If I have any more questions I'll post. Thanks!

 

[Chaotic42]

I'd get a seperate hard drive, but you don't have to. Linux can boot from anywhere, so that isn't an issue. I think it's better to be safe and just get a second drive, but I have Windows XP, Windows 2000, DOS, and Debian Linux all on the same physical drive. No problems here.


Your Radeon should work with X, I have a 9700 that works well. All of your drives will work, I don't know about the soundcard though. I would imagine that it does, but I can't say for sure.

 

[cleverhandle]

The SBLive is very well supported under Linux - no problems, there.

 

[eklass]

best to get a seconds hard drive, although it is possible to install it in a partition

in either case, you want to install windows first on the primary partition or drive, and than install linux on the secondary partition/drive

linux will play nicely and allow you to boot to windows (although as of a few years ago i had to configure lilo myself for it to "find" windows) whereas windows won't do the same for linux

no matter how you go about it, windows first, linux second

also, if you've got other people using the computer and you want no chance of them booting into linux, you can opt to have the bootloader thingy installed on a floppy instead of in the mbr. this way, to boot to linux, you pop in the floppy and restart the computer. with no floppy, there is no linux. i kinda liked this since my mom flipped when she saw lilo 🙂

 

[Roots]

Thanks guys, I'll probably get that second HDD after all. Another question arrises though, will I need to create a floppy disk or something so that on startup I can select which OS to run? Or will something be automatically genereated so that it gives me that option on startup all the time?

Also, I heard Win XP doesn't like other OS's on the same system, especially non-MS brand OS's...

 

[Chaotic42]

Originally posted by: Roots
Thanks guys, I'll probably get that second HDD after all. Another question arrises though, will I need to create a floppy disk or something so that on startup I can select which OS to run? Or will something be automatically genereated so that it gives me that option on startup all the time?

Also, I heard Win XP doesn't like other OS's on the same system, especially non-MS brand OS's...

If you don't use a floppy, you'll have to use a program to select which OS to use. Grub, for example, pops up with a menu. You select Linux or Windows.

Windows XP doesn't know that Linux exists, so it doesn't have a problem with it.

 

[Roots]

Yuk, I looked at those programs and they are some ridiculous amount of $$$. I highly doubt its worth it, unless there is some free app that some computer junkie developed to benefit all human-kind 😀 Does such a magical piece of software exist?

 

[elzmaddy]

Make a backup image of your WIndows XP partition if you can (using Norton Ghost, etc). There is a chance something could happen and you will be unable to boot into it. That happened to me -- I believe the message was NTLDR not found or something. I probably wasn't following the directions properly.

But when I did have RH9 and WinXP coexisting on the same drive, and I was able to boot into Linux with GRUB. However, when I selected XP it woudl display some strange unintelligible message and then hang ... don't remember it. I suppose I can try again carefully following the directions verbatim 😉

 

[drag]

Originally posted by: Roots
Yuk, I looked at those programs and they are some ridiculous amount of $$$. I highly doubt its worth it, unless there is some free app that some computer junkie developed to benefit all human-kind 😀 Does such a magical piece of software exist?

Whatca mean? Which program? If you mean grub (although lilo is a bit newb-friendly), it's free, free beer and freedom. And some magical piece of software does exist! Two major examples are Linux and BSD and all the software associated with them!

Well anyways. Probably the most "perfect" way to dual boot would be:
get the second harddrive...
take the XP hd out, put the new unused hd in as the secondary master (as long as you bios supports booting off of the secondary master, which it probably does).
install linux make a boot floppy.
and then put windows disk back in it's original spot as the primary master. (of course I wouldn't take everything out, just pull the power and ide cords and put them back in when your finished)
I personally used my motherboard's bios to select the boot disk, if I hit f8 during POST I could select to boot off of the floppy, cdrom, and either hd. But if you can't do that, just use the floppy.
Once you get a good understanding of how lilo or grub works, then make a rescue floppy for XP and go ahead and install the linux boot loader in the MBR of the XP disk and just use that to select the OS.

Rescue floppies are your friends, also in linux most install cd's double as a mini-linux OS that can be used for emergency rescue stuff.

That way it is the safest, due to the fact that linux and windows uses different naming conventions for the HD it's very easy to mistakenly format the wrong disk. Of course if you have a big disk with a partition in it that you don't care about, you could format that and install linux and forgo the expense of the extra HD, but then again it's a convenent excuse to upgrade isn't it?

I personally can't recomend utilities like partition magic to make room on your harddrive. The work fine most of the time, but occasionally they can do bad things to your information. It's worth the risk if you don't have anything too important and you make backups though.

 

[Chaotic42]

Originally posted by: Roots
Yuk, I looked at those programs and they are some ridiculous amount of $$$. I highly doubt its worth it, unless there is some free app that some computer junkie developed to benefit all human-kind 😀 Does such a magical piece of software exist?

Huh?

Grub is free, so is lilo. Link.

 

[Platypus]

Your hardware is fine, but might I ask why you're willing to inviest in another hard drive when it's easy to just partition your existing drive? Just my two cents.