# Dual Booting Mandrake 9 / XP



## lonesome_wolf2000 (Dec 23, 2000)

I've read several posts on dual booting XP & Linux. Most of which have people resizing their partitions. I've got 2 different hard drives, an 80 gig, and a 20 gig. 

Heres the scheme I'm looking at having:

80 GB:
Partition 1- 50gb, Windows Primary
Partition 2 - 30gb, Backup (for storage, mp3's, apps, etc)

20 GB
All Linux

What would be the best procedure to install xp & mandrake like this? And as far as the boot manager issue, what will i need to do there? I haven't messed too much with dual boot... 

Can I modify XP's boot.ini? or will i have to use lilo/grub to choose between xp and linux? or something else?


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## mobo (Feb 23, 2003)

First thing first : 50 gig is probably too big for a partition. The unwritten rule is around 25. It would take forever to access info and defrag that sucker.

Windows has to be installed first then linux after so the linux boot loader will include the two. At bootup you should be prompted to select the os of your choice. I have triple booted with linux succesfully in the past and it worked great.


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## lynch (Aug 3, 2002)

My scheme(or 2 cents)
As motherboard pointed out,install XP 1st.I make a 3 GB partition when I install XP or w2k for the same reason:shorter defrag time.I then make partitions for everything else.As for Linux,I would just point to the second hard drive during install and let Mandrake do the partitioning.When asked,tell it to use the whole disk.As for the bootloader,I put it on the master boot record.If you use PartitionMagic be sure to unhide the XP partition before you install Mandrake but I am thinking PM is not really even needed when installing Mandrake because of it's own NTFS partition re-sizer.
HTH
lynch


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## lonesome_wolf2000 (Dec 23, 2000)

Thanks for all the input guys, here's what I did. AND IT WORKS!

1. Install Windows XP on the first disk, first partition.
2. Installed linux on the 2nd disk, and put bootloader on hda
3. When they were both installed, grub took care of the rest for me!
4. After I had both OS's installed, i then was able to setup the remaining partition(s) on the primary disk just fine as well.


Now grub comes up when I start my computer and I can now pick from XP or Linux!


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## mobo (Feb 23, 2003)

Glad to hear your setup but now the real work comes. You'll have many an hour trying to get linux under your control if you're like most users. It is so different than windows and not really for a newbie. It is worth learning and a real fast internet browsing system . Ip personally like the konquerer browser. After using every version of windows except millenium and after mandrake and soon to be red hat i have to say the fastest browsing came with linux(hands down)

Have fun


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## lonesome_wolf2000 (Dec 23, 2000)

Thanks again everyone. 

I shouldn't have problems using linux, I have been messing with it for quite some time.

It was the dual boot thing I was worried about. Easy as pie when you know how and have the right software.

btw, Im using Mandrake 9.0


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## krobi (Jun 27, 2003)

Hi. I am planning to dual boot Mandrake and XP also, but I have a different setup.

Master: 7GB; FAT32; Currently running Windows 98
Slave: 40GB; FAT32; Currently running XP

Should I format the first hard drive and put Mandrake on that?

Thanks.
Kevin


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## mobo (Feb 23, 2003)

If it were my machine I would resize the 98 partition and add another there for linux. This way the lilo bootloader will take over on bootup and provide you with the option to choose which os to use.
Hope this helps.


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## krobi (Jun 27, 2003)

Thanks


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## mobo (Feb 23, 2003)

welcome


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## boltzfan (Jul 8, 2003)

Hello all.

I was wondering if any of you could help me. I used to have two hard drives (1 quantum Bigfoot 7 gig, and 2, Wetern Digital 20 gig.) I tried to run XP on 1) and linux on 2) with a Windows partition also on two since I didn't want all 20 gig going to linux. anytime I sarted my computer it would ask which I wanted to load. XP or Red Hat. I would try XP and it would go to another screen and never do anything. do you know why


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## boltzfan (Jul 8, 2003)

second I was wondering how would you recomend partitioning the hard drive to have both os on the 20 gig


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## boltzfan (Jul 8, 2003)

oh and FYI to install everything I want off the cd I need 6 gig


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## mobo (Feb 23, 2003)

Hi boltzfan...

In response to your situation i will give the rundown on what i would do. First i would use the 7 gig as master drive and this drive would house the dual operating systems. i would first load xp on this drive then get it operational (updates etc.)then proceed to load linux on after xp is running. as far as partitioning goes ,I would give xp 4 gig and linux 3 gig. in addition if you are given choice of the format type (file system)i would use fat 32 for linux so xp will see it . Then use the 20 gig drive as slave and this is where storage goes(music, files,pictures,programs etc)

When you load linux after xp the lilo bootloader will take over when starting up and then you will ba able to select.

to answer your question about the xp not booting....Its because it cannot find the boot.ini files because they are on another hard drive.

Hope this helps


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## codejockey (Feb 11, 2002)

> in addition if you are given choice of the format type (file system)i would use fat 32 for linux so xp will see it


Wow! -- AFAIK, this isn't an option with any version of Linux I've run into (at least in native mode; UMSDOS isn't under consideration), so I'd definitely be interested in the details. That said, Linux filesystems (ext2, ext3, reiserfs, xfs, jfs, etc.) are all superior to FAT32, so there's not a lot of reasons to consider FAT32 for a Linux filesystem (if, indeed, it's supported). My $0.02 worth: choose reiserfs, ext3 or ext2 (in descending order of preference) for your Linux filesystems.


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## mobo (Feb 23, 2003)

Codejockey

i appreciate your comments and expertise with linux so i will ask ...Does xp have the ability to see and read those listed file systems ?


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## codejockey (Feb 11, 2002)

I'm not aware of any support in XP for Linux filesystems (but since I don't run XP, I'm hardly an expert ). It would be great if some Windoze, any Windoze, understood Linux filesystems for exactly the reason you gave -- you could access your Linux files from Windoze. I'd love to know about it if it happens, but right now, I'm under the impression that Windoze only knows about MS-type filesystems (FAT, FAT32, NTFS). Updates, anyone?


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## boltzfan (Jul 8, 2003)

do any of you know what I need to type in the file boot.ini to get it to load linux from the sartup screen of windows

I have it showing up but I don't have the right path I guess


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## lynch (Aug 3, 2002)

Try this:tutorial 
HTH
lynch


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## Vailor (Jul 16, 2003)

I recently tried installing RedHat 6....already have xp install... tried installing on my second drive and installed fine except LILO didnt have xp in it and only booted into RH

I also recently DL'd RH9 and Mandrake 9.1 and burned em... which should I use and will I get the same effect as b4?

any help much appriciated...

BTW I havent really used Linux b4 and I am just trying to learn it for future use in the IT Networking career industry...


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## lonesome_wolf2000 (Dec 23, 2000)

Vailor,

I have Mandrake 9.0, and I have had great success with it. I installed xp normally, and then ran through mandrakes install. if you just let mandrake do the critical stuff (don't do expert install) you will definitely not have to mess with anything. It should use grub as the bootloader and give you the option of linux or xp. 

(NOTE: in the bootloader menu, XP might be listed as NT)

I haven't used redhat since 7.1 or 7.2, so i can't be much help there.

Good Luck


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## Vailor (Jul 16, 2003)

thanx alot! will try asap


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## tym1200 (Jul 22, 2003)

I've read this and I think I have a good idea about what Im going to do, but im going to run it through you guys to make sure it sounds ok.

Right now I have XP on my primary master(40gb)
and I have an empty 10gb hd as my primary slave

Im going to install redhat on the primary slave(hdb), and install the bootloader(not sure which one) on the primary master(hda). 

Which bootloader would you recommend?

Then when I reboot after the install, I should be able to choose between XP and Redhat from the bootloader?


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## tym1200 (Jul 22, 2003)

I probly will be using XP more than linux though, so could I just not install a bootloader during the Red Hat installation, but choose to create a boot disk that will load linux when its in, and when its not in, XP will load?


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## lynch (Aug 3, 2002)

Yes you can.If it gives you the option,make several bootdisks.
HTH
lynch


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## shardrock (Jul 22, 2003)

that all sounds good, although when I intsalled RH 9 & XP I intstalled Linux first--seems to work ok though.


do any of you guys know of a way to change the default OS in GRUB? I want to be able to boot to XP automatically.


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