I am a new to Linux but I was able to get it installed on my laptop also running XP Pro. I have an IBM Thinkpad T20 with a 20gig drive and this is how I installed my computer with XP Pro & Mandrake 8.1. I know alot of you reading this will question my method of installing it, but it worked without any problems! This is especially good info if you are new to linux and want to dual boot with XP. 1. I booted my laptop off the XP Pro CD, when setup started, I deleted all existing partitions, I then created just my first partition with NTFS using about 14-15 gigs of space, I didn't mess with the remaining space! I wanted to use most of my space for XP since I am really just installing Mandrake as a learning tool. 2. After I formatted the 1st partition using XP's CD, I installed XP and made sure I was able to get it to load up and everything. 3. Now, I installed the Mandrake 8.1 CD1 in the cd drive and booted off of it. I selected the Expert Installation. After the setup began, I got to the partitioning/format section, and this is how I elected to use the remaining space I had on the harddrive. Note: I did not touch the existing ntfs partition (hda1) that I made with XP's setup, I just made linux partitions using the remaining 4-5 gigs I had on my drive. I had no free space after I made the linux partitions. 1st hda1 is NTFS using 14gig for XP Pro 2nd hda5 is Linux Native using 2.4gig as / 3nd hda6 is Linux Swap using 302mb 4th hda7 is Linux Native using 1.1 as /home There is a million different ways to setup partitions under linux, sure I could of made a /usr partition, a larger swap file, etc. I decided to partition it this way, because I wanted to keep it simple. Maybe after I get more used to Linux, I will change my partitioning methods, but this should be ok for me as a newbie. 4. After I partioned/formatted the remaining space in Linux, I went through the rest of the setup and selected all the stuff I wanted to install, it took me about 18-20 minutes for it to copy all the files over, I also was prompted for CD2 during the copy process, it's part of the expert install I believe. 5. After the files copied over, I went through the remaining setup options, now I am here at the linux boot-disk section. Since on a T20, you can only use either the DVD or floppy (not both at the same time) I didn't make the boot-disk, the first time, I removed my DVD and installed the floppy but that of course locked up my computer. So I didn't make a boot-disk. Now the bootloader screen came up, I selected LILo with graphic menu, and left the boot device as /dev/hda. I then left all the boot entries on the next screen alone. Now it installed the bootloader and I continued onto the Xfree, video display part to finish up the installation. 6. After it rebooted, I get the LILO boot screen and I can run either Linux or XP. I rebooted to each OS a few times to ensure I had no problems and I am good to go. NOTES: Since I wasn't able to make the bootdisk, I was worried, but since I can boot of my dvd, I can boot off the linux CD and hit the F1 option for rescue, so not as a big as I thought. As far as swap file size, since I have 256ram already, I figured I wouldn't need much of a swap file, especially for being a newbie at linux, I can barely figure out how to change the desktop around, plus I don't plan on using it for anything more then a learning tool. Another note: the sound worked right away on my T20, I didn't have to change any drivers/file entries or anything, so that is a big plus for me! I know there is alot of posted about dual booting with linux, but I was looking for a post just like the one I am making, I think it will help alot of you out that may have been having problems. Please leave a response to this post if it helped you out. Sorry for any typos, I am in a hurry to play with Linux! Later, shramj

In case you care... I myself would like to load XP from Lilo and not the other way around ( I have seen the trick to add the lilo generated boot sector to c:\boot.ini. I guess this would work but I'd prefer Lilo to start first -- I just enjoy Microsoft coming second! :-)) Having LILO as the MBR requires having BOTH the Linux kernel _and_ the Windows XP kernel _below_ the 1024 cylinder on the harddisk. My partitioning (see below) achieves this. I tried it both ways, both with the C:\boot.ini thing _and_ with LILO in the MBR. Turned out LILO MBR worked but that booting Linux from C:\boot.ini didn't, for me. _______ Kind of surprising considering all the previous struggle I had had getting LILO in the MBR to boot XP. All I know is I recognised a lot of the struggles people have been writing about, and suddenly they were gone and things just worked again as it always have in the past with MSDOS 6.2 / Win 3.1, Windows 95, Windows 98, NT, Windows 2000 and now Windows XP. I have done my dual boot strategy with them all, and it is a sound -- if tedious -- technuiqe. Nowadays I try to force the hardware supplier to place the OS at cylinders 2 to 1023, counting from 0 -- or if he counts from 1, at cylinders 3 to 1024. That way, even if I have to reorder the partition numbering in the partition table in the MBR manually -- which I have written a little shell script using dd for -- I can always either from Linux or from XP's rescue system fix c:\boot.ini afterwards AS LONG AS I DO IT BEFORE ACTIVATING THE OS FOR THE FIRST TIME .. i.e. before ever running it. Then I run a Linux rescue CD with a script of mine to set up partitions and filesystems. This is my general layout: Disk /dev/hda: 9729 cylinders, 255 heads, 63 sectors/track Units = cylinders of 8225280 bytes, blocks of 1024 bytes, counting from 0 Dev__Boot_Start__End_#cyls__#blocks___Id__System______Mountpoint hda1_________0+____1____2-____16033+__83__Linux_______/boot hda2___*_____2+_1023_1022-__8209183+___b__Win95_FAT32_/C__[C:] hda3______1024__2047_1024___8225280____b__Win95_FAT32_/G__[G:] hda4______2048__9728_7681__61697632+___f__Win95_Ext'd_(LBA) hda5______2048+_3071_1024-__8225248+__83__Linux_______/images hda6______3072+_4095_1024-__8225248+__83__Linux_______/cdmaster hda7______4096+_4195__100-___803218+__82__Linux_swap hda8______4196+_4261___66-___530113+__83__Linux_______/ hda9______4262+_5285_1024-__8225248+__83__Linux_______/usr hda10_____5286+_5417__132-__1060258+__83__Linux_______/var hda11_____5418+_6441_1024-__8225248+__83__Linux_______/opt hda12_____6442+_7337__896-__7197088+__83__Linux_______/home hda13_____7338+_7475__138-__1108453+__83__Linux_______/tmp hda14_____7476+_9728_2253-_18097191____b__Win95_FAT32_/F__[F:] (The "-" and "+" means subtract or add 512 byte from the cylinder boundary -- in the space beween there are partition tables, boot records and stuff. I use sfdisk to see all this info. And for all my formatting.) Anyway, this is my working lilo.conf: #boot = /dev/fd0 boot = /dev/hda vga = 771 read-only menu-scheme = Wg:kw:Wg:Wg lba32 prompt #timeout = 80 timeout = 300 message = /boot/message default = XP image = /boot/vmlinuz append = "disableapic hdc=scsi hdd=scsi" label = linux root = /dev/hda8 initrd = /boot/initrd image = /boot/vmlinuz.suse append = "disableapic hdc=scsi hdd=scsi" label = suse root = /dev/hda8 initrd = /boot/initrd.suse optional image = /boot/memtest.bin label = memtest86 #image = /boot/ORIGINALMBR other = /dev/hda2 change automatic optional label = XP table = /dev/hda loader = /boot/chain.b Take care, Leif_Erlingsson______________+46-70-447-8271_____+46-8-778-5038 Katrinebergsvagen_70 146_50__Tullinge,__Sweden____leif@lege.com_______http://lege.com ech`echo unli|tr il oc|sed 'su\([su]\)\([on]\)uo li\2\1x is u'`ol

Actually, LILO does load first, I just change the lilo config to start Windows XP as default. Take Care. Joe

I say: Linux is more intelligent or MS just dont want a neigbhoor... I have tried to install XP after Linux (2 parititons) and he said: "windows have detected another OS, windows can't install or install over". If anyone have tried to format his Windows partition while having both OS (LINUX MANDRAKE/WINDOWS XP) on 1 HD of 40 GB, i would like to any advices on the matter. Thanx

I installed mandrake 8.2 and windows xp together on a 40 gig maxtor. WIndows xp was installed first and i ran partition magic 7 and installed my linux partition and linux swap and installed mandrake from the mandrake Cd Done no problems no nuttin.THat was maybe just my luck though,The only bad thing is when windows XP craps out Which is obviously going to happen sometime or another :). You gotta reinstall both os's again.

Hey everyone! I have been trying to dual boot with linux and xp on a 20gb hd, i installed xp first then linux but i keep getting errors on the lines of not being able to allocate root partiction. I then wiped everything off and and installed linux first with 3 partitions(l native,l swap, fat32) and this worked fine. I then went to install xp but it decided that it couldn't install to this partition for the reason of it not being extended. I removed the partition, and then created a new one but it didn't want to work, same reason. Any ideas?!? It's quite stressful, all i want is windows and linux, is it that so hard? anyway, any ideas pop up let me know! Thanks, Philip

Yup, I am a Linux newbie. My OS is XP running on an HP xt963. I am interested in installing RedHat 7.3 on a separate drive (already installed). I am presently searching for drivers for other hardware (i.e. internal modem, cd r/w, printer, floppy drive, and I don't know what else I need). Once having this info together, I need info/help on how to do the dual boot. I have seen mention lilo and another thing. I don't know what lilo is but I hope I don't get limited. My hard drive is 100 GB. Where can I find information that is at the newbie level recommending partition sizes, etc? Lots of questions. Want to make this work and also to have XP running (my wife would kill me if she could not get to the internet). Thanks for your help. It would be great to get this in email where I can print it out.