I'm new to the Solaris community. In fact, I will never abandon MS Windows, but I'd like to get into the UNIX (and similar) world so I have an understanding of it. Can my computer (Athlon 1.8GHz, 512 DDR, 160GB HDD) run Solaris 10? I don't run a server, and it has x86 32bit architecture. I have previously set up Solaris (and still have the disks) on this machine, but never used it, as the HDD I was using was suddenly needed elsewhere. If I modify and add partitions during the Solaris installation, will it affect my XP installation? There is more than enough free space on the drive, but I'd like to know if.. 1. ..Windows and Solaris will be selectable from a boot menu of some kind? 2. ..Windows system files will be damaged (or confused) by the change? Thanks! kevin PS good freeware site for Solaris software other than Sun?

KiShKoN: Sorry I can't really answer your questions about Solaris 10 x86. I do deal with Solaris 9 and 8 Sparc Solaris. I much prefer Linux over Solaris. There is much more out there for Linux than Solaris. You may want to consider some variety of Linux over Solaris For freeware have you looked at: http://sunfreeware.com? HaroldW

yes it will work on your x86, it will use the GRUB bootloader which works well with windows, when u boot up your box u will have a decision of which OS to start, and no it wont ruin your XP install, i would run defrag a couple of times and use a partition utility to create a partition for solaris from in windows. i have experienced problems when solaris made the partition for me, u need a minimum of 6 GB. i run OpenSolaris 10 on VMware, the dual boot setup is pretty straight forward but if it dont work consider using VMware

Thanks, I was wondering though...the Microsoft Management Console doesn't let you modify the boot partition of a drive. What is a *free* partition resizer for NTFS? The freeware app "Partition Resizer" is not NTFS compatible (or at least reccommends against NTFS use). The demo of PartitionMagic didn't work when i tried it...it wouldn't let me apply my changes because it was the demo. With this kind of software that makes the kind of changes that it does, I don't trust a software crack to make the program both usefull and safe at the same time. -Kevin PS can anyone see a signature (should say KiShKoN). I can't, even when I'm not signed in.

no sig, Ranish Partition Manager is a freeware utility for resizing partitions