Dual boot Windows XP and Fedora 9

[PBParrot]

I'm going to reformat my crappy old PC tonight, my XP install is rotted all to hell its taking me 5 mins to start up Firefox :/

My plan here is to partition my 160GB HDD into 3 partitions
10GB for Fedora 9
20GB for Windows XP
and the rest an NTFS partition for data

my question is would I need a boot loader to do this?

At ITT When we did this we didn't need one but since i'm also including a data partition (and reading into it apparently a lot of people have problems with dual booting this) I'm wondering if I need a boot loader, something Ive never used before.

 

[Tymon]

no, fedora has a partitioner that should do all the work for you, assuming you do it in the correct order

install XP first, only give the partition what you want it to use, then the fedora installer should split the rest evenly if you set it to do that.

it should boot just fine without a loader

 

[PBParrot]

So I should have XP install 2 partitions say 20 for the OS and 130 for the Data partition and leave the rest unformatted and use that for Fedora?

 

[Tymon]

just install XP's partition with windows partitioner. install the data one and fedora's with fedora's partitioner, you can do NTFS and it's more accurate

 

[PBParrot]

ill be able to make it NTFS right from the start using Fedora 9s partitioner?

 

[Tristam Green]

you don't want linux to run on an NTFS partition, if that's your question.

Windows XP has a decent partitioner itself.

1) Install WinXP on an NTFS partition.
2) Install Fedora on the remaining partition, probably as ext3fs.
3) Let GRUB do the loading for you. As a matter of fact, the latest versions of GRUB will automatically allow it to detect the Windows Installation, and label it in /etc/grub/menu.lst.

Likewise, it *should* be able to read the NTFS partition even on the linux side

 

[Tristam Green]

So I should have XP install 2 partitions say 20 for the OS and 130 for the Data partition and leave the rest unformatted and use that for Fedora?

My apologies, I just read this.

A 150GB hard drive, I would split as thus:

40gb Windows NTFS - windows programs install a lot of crap by default in their Program Files directories (games especially, so they will rack up space FAST.)
8gb Linux ext3fs - if it requires more, give it a little more.
2gb SWAP - virtual memory area for your Linux Partition. I rarely even tap into it, but you want it to be fairly sizable.
100gb data (NTFS) - Readable by Windows, readable by FC9. Store all your data here, and you shouldn't even need to touch /home/username on the Linux side.

 

[PBParrot]

nice little surprise!

apparently the XP CD I iso'd from school wasn't XP Home its was XP Pro

I lost my XP CD somewhere ;-;

Hopefully using the universal student key won't cause any problems >_>

 

[PBParrot]

Success my PC now dual boots Fedora 9 and XP Pro

although somehow I managed to install XP Pro twice and now one of the installs point sto a non existent partition but not a problem >_>

thanks guys~

 

[Princemercury]

Open your boot.ini on your root partition and delete the entry to clean it up.

 

[PBParrot]

Open your boot.ini on your root partition and delete the entry to clean it up.

Thanks

deleted the wrong one the 1st time and had to fix it lol

This is why linux is useful D: