Duel Boot Or Not?

[jimras]

I have tried and enjoyed playing around with Knoppix running it from the CD

I am ready to give Mandrake or Red Hat a try. My question is this.

Since these have to be installed on the HD, I am concerned about screwing up my windows installation. I have a second 80 Gig HD in the machine that is basically just sitting there with not much on in. I could clean that off and then install the Linux onto that drive. Now--here's the question. Should I just use the BIOS to decide which HD to boot from or should I set up a dual boot??

I have no experience with setting up a second OS on a computer and would like to avoid problems if at all possible.

Any thoughts from you experts would be appreciated!!

Thanks........Jim

[shanenin]

Definately dual boot. I have never set up linux on a second harddrive but I am pretty sure the installer will give you the option to install there. It will probably do it for you automatically. you first ide device(your first harddrive) is called /dev/hda your second ide device(your second harddrive) is called /dev/hdb . You will want to tell the installer to put linux on /dev/hdb. You also want to choose the option to install your bootloader on the MBR, this way you will be given the option to boot windows or linux.

[jimras]

OK Makes sense, I guess.

Do both Mandrake and Red Hat have similar installers built into the CD's??

I'm sorry to ask such simple questions, but I have NO experience installing Linux at all.

I've been a windows prisoner ever since DOS bit the dust!! I didn't like 95 and I didn't like 98 and I sure as heck didn't like 2000

I think that the think that I didn't like is the lack of control over what's going on. With DOS I liked working from the command line.

[shanenin]

if you like control, you may like linux :-)

I would reccomend something like ubuntu, it uses a nice package manager, apt-get. I like it and people say nothing but good stuff about it. Mandrake would also be a good choice, buts it package manager probably is not as good as apt-get.

http://us.releases.ubuntu.com/releases/5.0...386.iso.torrent

http://us.releases.ubuntu.com/releases/5.0...nstall-i386.iso

most distros have very good, easy to follow installers. They are all very similar.

A few tough installs would be debian or gentoo, slackware is also tougher then most(easier then the two former)

Edited April 30, 2005 by shanenin

[robroy]

I installed Iccaros linux on my second hard drive and it took care of setting up the dual boot menu. Works great

[Loki]

Mandrake's Installer is based off Redhat's and NOw you would use Fedora which is totaly red hat to boot (excuse the pun). Slackware's Installer is like FreeBSD's SUSE is like RedHat's. I have never done debian but Gentoo is like FreeBSD's also.

[hitest]

if you like control, you may like linux :-)

I would reccomend something like ubuntu, it uses a nice package manager, apt-get. I like it and people say nothing but good stuff about it. Mandrake would also be a good choice, buts it package manager probably is not as good as apt-get.

http://us.releases.ubuntu.com/releases/5.0...386.iso.torrent

http://us.releases.ubuntu.com/releases/5.0...nstall-i386.iso

most distros have very good, easy to follow installers. They are all very similar.

A few tough installs would be debian or gentoo, slackware is also tougher then most(easier then the two former)

I'm also really liking Ubuntu, I just installed it a few days ago. apt-get and Synaptic are excellent ways to keep your unit up to date.

I've also used Mandrake 10.1 and Fedora Core 3, both excellent distros.

For a first install I would not recommend Slackware or BSD.

[jcl]

I have never done debian but Gentoo is like FreeBSD's also.

Debian has an archaic, but usable, textual installer. Gentoo doesn't have an installer, so I'm not sure what you're implying about FreeBSD

[tictoc5150]

if you like control, you may like linux :-)

I would reccomend something like ubuntu, it uses a nice package manager, apt-get. I like it and people say nothing but good stuff about it. Mandrake would also be a good choice, buts it package manager probably is not as good as apt-get.

http://us.releases.ubuntu.com/releases/5.0...386.iso.torrent

http://us.releases.ubuntu.com/releases/5.0...nstall-i386.iso

most distros have very good, easy to follow installers. They are all very similar.

A few tough installs would be debian or gentoo, slackware is also tougher then most(easier then the two former)

I'm also really liking Ubuntu, I just installed it a few days ago. apt-get and Synaptic are excellent ways to keep your unit up to date.

I've also used Mandrake 10.1 and Fedora Core 3, both excellent distros.

For a first install I would not recommend Slackware or BSD.

I guess I'll chime in with one more distro thats worth a look.

After finding myself in some dependency hell with Ubuntu, I decided to give SimplyMEPIS 3.3(also Debian based) a try on my test machine...seems very cool so far and none of the dependency issues on Ubuntu

Oh, and the install doesn't get any easier than this...it installs from the live cd while in kde...that pretty much says newbie friendly to me.

gonna play with it for a while and reserve judgement til I find a problem but if it keeps going this way, I can see installing it as my main OS (well, maybe I'll wait a couple weeks for SimplyMEPIS 3.4)

[hitest]

Hi tictoc,

I've run ubuntu for a few days.

It's not too bad. However, on this old Plll 500 I've found that it uses more system resources than Mandrake 10.1 did, it's going into swap a fair bit running KDE 3.4.0.

Also, it doesn't recognize my legacy sound card.

Thankfully Mandrake 10.1 finds all of my hardware including my sound card.

Methinks I'm going to order Mandriva 2005 and give that a whirl, I've always had great hardware success using Mandrake products. Hopefully Mandriva has sndconfig on it.

[hitest]

Hi tictoc,

I just ordered the Mandriva 2005 4 CD set.

I'm curious to see how it runs on this desktop. If I don't like it I'll re-install Ubuntu 5.04.

Linux rules.

[Dragon]

well yesterday I just installed SUSE 9.1, the install went very simple. and it supports most of my stuff, the only thing I can't get working at the moment is my Lexmark printer.

I'm on a dual boot with two HDD's, and it also allows file swapping with Windows XP fairly easily, have yet to try an use WINE or similar on it. but IMO SUSE is a good program for newbies to get their feet wet with Linux.

too bad they are a subsidiary of Novell Now lol

[jimras]

Well, I am just about ready to take the big Linux plunge!!

I have downloaded the three ISO's for Mandrake 10.1 and burned them to CDs. BTW--thanks for the tip about the Deep Burner program....I LOVE it!!

I have the second 80 Gig HD all cleaned off and formatted and ready to go.

A couple of quick questions---I assume that you boot from CD 1 to install, correct???

The other question I had asked long ago and never did get a clear answer to it.

Can I install EVERYTHING on the second HD and then boot from that drive by selecting HD1 in the BIOS for the boot to Linux (and keep HD0 for Windows rather than letting Linus setup a dual boot? Is there an advantage to doing it one way or the other??

I have gone thru heck getting my WinXP Pro updated and running right and I just am afraid of doing anything that might possibly screw it up!!

Some expert opinions????

[tictoc5150]

Some expert opinions????

Well, an expert, I'm not but I can give you a few of the answers you're looking for.

Yes, you set your BIOS to boot from your CD drive and start with CD1

Yes you can install Mandrake (er...mandriva or whatever) on the slave and not touch your windows drive...as for where to install the bootloader, I believe you could install it on the first sector of the linux drive and boot the way you describe but I personally have never had a problem with installing it on the MBR of my windows drive....even just testing distros, I'd just pop the windows cd in after and do a "fixmbr" and all is well.

Is there an advantage to doing it one way or the other??

The advantage I see in installing it to the windows drive is, not having to go into the BIOS every time you want to boot to linux.

another option that you might consider is intalling the bootloader on a floppy (if you have one) and set your BIOS to boot from floppy first...then you'd just need to put the diskette in any time you want to boot to linux.

welcome to linux and hope this helps,

T.