Linux Installation Under XP

[Rayus]

Hello, this is my first time installing linux and I was going to install Redhat 8.0 Personal. I'm going to create a partition prior to install using Partition Magic 8.0 and I was wondering if I should create one or two partitions. I know that I need a swap partition but I am unsure if it will be created or not if I only make one partition. Also I was wondering, if I do need to make two partitions, how large should I make the swap partition? I appreciate any help.

[prowriter]

Here's what worked for me. I didn't make any Linux partitions first. I just used Partition Mag. to make my WinXP partition the size I wanted it. (Ex: Resized it from 19500Gigs down to 6 gigs on a 20 gig harddrifve.) I left the rest of the drive as "free space" not even formatted or partitioned in any way. Then, after that was in place, I booted the first disk of RH8, and then, when it came to the place where you choose how to partition, I let RH8 figure my Linux partitions in the free space. It made a swap one, a boot one, and the rest of the drive was given to the main Linux program, in addition to leaving my WinXP partition alone. You can check a box that let's you look at this to make sure. The only other thing that is important, I think, is that when it comes time to set up the boot area, I left the choice at Grub bootloader, and changed the word DOS in the partition to WinXP. (Maybe this last doesn't matter, but when I didn't do that in RH 7.3, it messed up the dual boot loader.) Anyway, if someone has something different to suggest, please do. :-) Hope that helps.
Flo M.

[PerfectBlue]

The only thing that i'd done and different from Rayus was created a partition for linux in xp by using partition magic. Yes you need to create one partition for linux maybe 5 GB and another swap partition like 300-500MB :) Then when i install RH, it detected the partition and i just install it into the partition created for it.

[JohnT]

With PM one partition is enough. Linux will configure the rest. Defrag XP before you start with PM.