Dual Booting

[Guru533]

Could I get opinions on dual booting? I currently have a computer running Win98 SE and want to install Linux, but heard a lot of bad things about dual booting. Could somebody tell me the best way to go about installing Linux? Should I uninstall Windows first, install Linux, then reinstall Windows or vice-versa?

[Xayd]

Definitely install Windows first. It's the least painful from my experiences.

All you need to do after installing Windows and configuring it to your needs, is partition the drive and specify the drive needs that Linux wants, you can set Linux to take up the remainder of the partition which should work ok. The program I've used and had zero problems with is FIPS, a free DOS utility that partitions by the drive sector that you specify.

Only thing from my troubles with this that I have learned you MUST do is defrag the drive. Windows tends to waste drive space, and if you put a Linux partition over some Windows files hanging around in the upper sectors you're gonna have problems.

You can get FIPS free on the net, and be sure to get RESTORRB with it, that's the DOS utility that restores your old boot image in case something doesn't work properly. If you get Red Hat, those utilities will be on the Red Hat CD as well. If something goes haywire you just restore your old boot image and run a full scandisk in Windows, and Windows'll see the Linux partition as an error and wipe it.

Xayd