Re: A question on partitioning in dual-boot machines.

On 27.03.2005 11:32, ludvikengelbrekt@yahoo.co.uk wrote:

> Windows to Linux, as soon as the 9.3 comes out. I will, however,
make a
> dual-boot machine and in spite of looking at the SuSE guide and some

> howtos, there´s one small question left unanswered.
>
> It would be practical to make Win(98) exist on multiple fat
partitions or
> "drives" (a few small ones for Win and a huge one for Linux),
however e.g.
> the SuSE guide explicitly deals only with installing on a SINGLE fat

> partition.

I wouldn't install Linux on a FAT partition. Instead I'd recommend,
for
each OS, a separate system partitions formatted with its preferred
file
system - FAT for Windows, Reiser or ext3 for Linux - and then a shared

data partition formatted with FAT as the lowest common denominator.
(In addition, Linux likes to have a separate partition for its swap
area, in contrast to Windows which prefers a file within its system
partition for that purpose. So set aside a small slice of your disk
of,
say, twice your RAM size, for that.)

> So: does SuSE recognise the multiple partitions during installation
and
> allow to install itself on one of them, and if, how does one do
this?

It certainly recognizes all the existing partitions and allows you toinclude them in the directory tree so they will all be accessible from

Linux. As to whether you will be able to install Linux into an
existing
FAT partition, I do not know and I never even cared, because I do notconsider that a sensible option. It allows you to create new
partitions
for that purpose, which IMHO is the right thing to do.

> Furthermore does this require some changes in LiLo, or something
else exotic???

I'd recommend GRUB over LILO. GRUB is also the default boot loader inall recent SuSE releases, which is in itself a reason to stick with
it,
if you aren't prepared to dig into the internals of the system more
than
necessary.

--
Christus ist auferstanden. Er ist wahrhaftig auferstanden.