Help dual booting with WinXP and Red Hat 9

[diggingforgold]

I got the Red Hat Linux 9 Bible from my work for about $35 (reg. $50), which comes with all the CD's and about a million pages of instructions (good for use after you get it installed)... but they don't help me much with dual booting.

I tried using PM8's 'install another os' wizard- only to find out their boot manager is crap and won't install on ntfs. I installed linux, the installation worked, but Linux wouldn't load completely. After trying to reboot, I noticed that PM8 hid my winxp ntfs partition... so without recovery disks (which I didn't make- no fdd), I couldn't easily get back to windows.

So I reformatted (NTFS) and now I'm on a completely fresh install of XP pro. I'm going to give PM8 another try, but this time, I will only use it to split my current partition.

(n00biE) Questions:

After I split the partition in PM8, then delete the new partition (unallocated), will Linux automatically use this unallocated part of my disk (and create it's own partition and format it and install itself to)?

And if so, will I need to use any third part boot managers to switch between the two installations, or does linux and winxp have their own boot managers? I don't want to get stuck with a non-working linux, and try to get back to windows only to find out that I can't.

Thanks!

 

[Arkaine23]

Here's what you need:

At least 5GB of unpartitioned space or of an unformmated partition. Just make one partition when installing windows, but leave some of empty space for linux. I recommend using Fat32 on at least one partition so that you can transfer files between the OS' easily, and don't make it in windows, make it when you install linux.

So- a partition for windows in NTFS or FAT32, and some unformatted space to install linux to.

You can do this with a fresh install of windows or by using PM8 on your current setup(if PM handles NTFS, which I think it does).




Boot loader- Redhat will install and configure its own bootloader that will give you a choice between OS' when you boot. All you have to do is choose between two different bootloaders- grub or lilo. I've used both and can't claim to think one is better than the other.


Linux partitions-

100mb /boot (bootloader goes in there) type = ext3

3+ GB for / - (the main OS components. I recommend more like 5GB+ minimum) type = ext3 or resierfs if that is an option

make a swap partition, type =swap, size = a couple hundred mb tops

/data ( whatever size you want, and name it whatever you want, this is some storage space for both OS's to use) type = vfat


By linux's naming conventions, this scheme would be:

Primary partitions:
/dev/hda1 is NTFS and holds windows
/dev/hda2 is ext3 and holds /boot
/dev/hda3 is ext3 or possibly reiserfs and holds / the main portion of your Linux install

Extended Logical partitions:
/dev/hda5 is swap
/dev/hda6 is Fat32/vfat and can be used by linux and windows



That may not make a lot of sense now, but redhat's installer is very easy to use. Partitions are the only complicated part, and all the info you need is here. It'll make sense when you see it during the redhat install.

 

[diggingforgold]

I understood everything above linux partitions... but everything below that made no sense to me . Maybe I will give it a second try and play it by ear.

Thanks for the help.

 

[Arkaine23]

Redhat uses a program called Disk Druid to make partitioning fairly easy during the install.

Basically, take about 5-10GB of unformatted space and use redhat's installer to partition that into 4 partitions.

/boot 100mb
/ 5GB+
swap 256mb or so sounds good
/data A couple GB or more would be good.


There are several types of linux filesystems. Ext3 is the main one you should use. Make /boot and / use ext3. Swap uses its own swap file system. /data should be vfat, which is basically FAT32. Your windows OS will be able to use the /data partition and so will Linux.

Linux, instead of calling drives C:, D:, E:, etc.... calls them /dev/hda1 (first drive, first partition), /dev/hda2 (first drive, second partition, /dev/hdb5 (second drive, 5th partition), etc...

 

[diggingforgold]

Gotcha


But when installing redhat the first time, I didnt remember any of this stuff. Maybe I'll notice it this time...

Thanks!

 

[diggingforgold]

Ok, now I'm having trouble just before redhat boots. It gets to the part where it says "remounting root filesystem in read/write mode: "

And then it just sits there and doesnt do anything. Anyone know of a fix for this? Or is it supposed to take all eternity?

Thanks!

 

[diggingforgold]

Fixed. Red hat doesn't like my USB keyboard. But with PS/2 works fine. Now I need to fix my refresh rate... I'm getting a headache.

 

[Arkaine23]

Redhat uses gnome as its window manager by default. You may find KDE a little better if you're just getting started with Linux. So if you want to, logout and log back in. There are buttons on the bottom of the screen (at least in RH 8 there are) that you can use to set the session type. Choose KDE and login again.

If in KDE:
Go to the K on the bottom left and choose control center. I think refresh rate can be set in the peripherals/monitor section. Don't forget to play around with the Control Center, its fun!