I don't recommend installing Linux on the first partition. Though there
seem to be quite a few FAQs and HOWTOs floating around out there talking
about doing this, I have found it to be fairly risky.
Instead, what I would do is use partition magic to create a small
partition between the large Windows (e.g. hda1) and large Linux
partions (e.g. hda3). It would be called hda2 and would contain /boot.
Then boot the install CD and install the linux bootloader to the /boot
partition.
When you restart, you will go directly back to windows like you never
installed anything, since nothing's been written to the master boot
record. The trick is this: There's a little DOS utility that comes
with partition magic that lets you select the "active partition". It's
extremely easy to use. There's a version of it installed onto your
Partition Magic "recovery disks" in fact....Anyway, in windows, run this
utility and set the your hda2 ("boot") partition to active. You will
reboot and should see GRUB.
Assuming you have partition magic available, I have found this method to
be pretty good. I think there are open source tools to do the same
thing but I don't remember what they're called.
Good luck
Kenny
On Sat, 2003-12-06 at 10:05, Aaron J. Greenwood wrote:
> A colleague asked me to help him install Linux on his Dell Inspion 5150
> Laptop computer with Nvidia graphics and running Windows XP.
>
>
> I used partition magic to repartition his 80 GB hard drive into two
> partitions one for XP and one for Fedora. XP was left in the first
> partition. Also, there is a tiny partitions for Dell utilities at the
> very beginning of the disk. Something I have never seen before.
>
>
> First installation attempt failed because X would not start properly.
>
>
> Second installation using text mode failed because the installation
> program while loading the installation and setup programs to disk
> reported that their was not enough disk space.
>
>
> I tried Red Hat 8. It hung during the boo process. I used disks I had
> installed from many times before.
>
>
> Also, install reported that it did not like creating the root directory
> on the second partition.
>
>
> I have through of moving XP to the second partition and installing Linux
> on the first partition if that would help ( What a potential nightmare).
>
>
> Any comments or suggestions would be appreciated.
>
>
>
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