Shown below is what I gots! Tell me what benefits I might gain from doing it. And what it might entail (ie; would I [more or less] have to start from "scratch" as far as my current installation is concerned]? (I have many small "convenience" apps installed, would I have to re-install them)? MIKE ______________________________ Microsoft Windows 98 4.10.2222 A IE 5 5.00.2614.3500 GenuineIntel x86 Family 6 Model 8 Stepping 6 511MB RAM Windows-managed swap file on drive C (48840MB free) Available space on drive C: 48840MB of 57225MB (FAT32) Name GORT User Name MIke Randall Processor(s) Model Intel(R) Pentium(R) III Speed 1000MHz Performance Rating PR1200 (estimated) L2 On-board Cache 256kB ECC synchronous ATC Mainboard and BIOS Bus(es) ISA AGP PCI USB SMBus/i2c MP Support No System BIOS Award Software International, Inc. 6.00 PG Mainboard M6VCT System Chipset VIA Technologies Inc VT82C691/693A/694X Apollo Pro/133/133A System Controller Front Side Bus Speed 1x 133MHz (133MHz data rate) Installed Memory 511MB SDRAM Memory Bus Speed 1x 133MHz (133MHz data rate) Video Board All-In-Wonder 128 Pro AGP "C" Label: THE BRAIN Type: Local Disk File system: FAT32 Used space:8,791,883,776 bytes (8.18GB) Free space: 51,213,271,040 bytes (47.6GB) Capacity: 60,005,154,816 bytes (55.8GB) I also Have SiSoft Sandra (V=FREE), and can pull any info from that that anyone might need to further assist with this. ____________________________

With that much free space, if it were up to me, I would try Mandrake Linux with KDE ;-) You would not have to reinstall windows to do that, just be sure and make a boot floppy when doing the installation so you can get into Mandrake. After the installation is done, you will boot up in Windows 98 when you turn the computer on, and boot up in Mandrake 8x when you use the linux boot floppy. I use both Windows and Linux on all of my machines. Linux can see into the Windows partitions, but Windows cannot see the linux partitions. Mandrake will take care of the partition set up during the installation. I have just set up Windows 95 on this machine, and will do Mandrake or Redhat next. Always install windows first, then Linux. Windows, if installed last will overwrite the boot record on the HDD of your Linux partitions.

Partitioning that drive will add a few safguards and maybe improve drive space usage. Having windows on a less than full drive partition will give you the option to keep your data and most programs seperate from windows. Therefore, if you have to format to fix a windows problem you don't wipe out everything else. Smaller partitions allow for smaller cluster sizes and that means less wasted space for file slack. Having several partitions allows you to have multiple operating system, each on their own logical drive, with data seperated from OS. Primarily, multi patitioning makes for easier/better organization of the drive's content and limits possibilities for total catastrophic info loss. Using a program like Partition Magic will allow adjusting partitions, without wiping all your data and programs.

get a program called partition magic, or anotehr similar program, and you can painlessly make new partitions. if you want to install another operating system, however, that comes with its own pitfalls and benefits

RE: Response 2: (paragraph 2) The best thing I ever did was to put Windows on C: and everything else on D:. I heartily concur with Tinkerbong-Although I sure don't know how he ever came up with that name!!! Don