About to take the plunge

[srr]

Hey everyone

This is a f1rst p0st!!!1, so an introduction is in order I guess.

I am a life-long windows user without any tech background. I don't get viruses on Windows, nor does it crash, misbehave, or do anything I don't like. I want to try out Linux because I can. I'm just curious and interested. I don't know much, but I am not at all daunted by the command line or learning new things. Actually I am looking forward to the learning curve. In any case, I am as noob as they come (never even installed or upgraded an OS since it was always Windows OEM), so thanks in advance for your patience.

Anyway I checked out some of the popular distros via LiveCD. I picked Fedora 8, and now I am finally ready to install Linux for the first time after messing with LiveCDs for a long time.

My PC has one IDE 80gb HDD. This has two partitions, one is Windows XP in NTFS, and the other is a recovery partition in FAT32. The two partitions take up the entire drive - there is no unclaimed space, but there is like 14gb free on the WinXP partition. I want to have a dual boot thing going, because of course this is only a trial of Linux. I see articles online that talk about resizing a windows partition, crossing your fingers, and hoping you don't erase everything. No. So I got a cheapo IDE HHD from newegg on the way. This is 80gb as well. What I'm wondering is: what do I do?

 

-Can I install Fedora 8 onto my new HDD and have my Windows drive perfectly safe (disconnect it during installation, even?)

 

-Assuming I can install Fedora onto a second IDE HDD, can I get a bootloader working that will let me choose the right OS even when they are on seperate drives?

 

-If I have a Windows bootloader on the original HDD, and then GRUB or whatever was installed with Fedora on the new HDD, would they conflict? Could I even load an OS?

 

-Could I boot into Fedora on HDD 2 and reach into my NTFS Windows partition on HDD 1 and pull out all my documents and music, and put them in my home folder to be all, you know, Linuxy?

 

-Am I going to break, ruin, render useless, erase, burn, melt, or kill anything?

 

Thanks everyone.

[anyweb]

hi and welcome !

now to your questions:-

 

-Can I install Fedora 8 onto my new HDD and have my Windows drive perfectly safe (disconnect it during installation, even?)

 

yes, no problem at all

-Assuming I can install Fedora onto a second IDE HDD, can I get a bootloader working that will let me choose the right OS even when they are on seperate drives?

 

yes you can, but if you want that to work automagically then keep the windows hdd in when installing fedora 8 on the second hdd, the GRUB bootloader will allow you (at boot time) to boot between windows or fedora

 

-If I have a Windows bootloader on the original HDD, and then GRUB or whatever was installed with Fedora on the new HDD, would they conflict? Could I even load an OS?

 

both grub and windows bootloaders can be reinstalled by the respective os installation (or live) cd, having a bootloader won't stop you from loading an OS and even if it does you can always remove the bootloader.

 

-Could I boot into Fedora on HDD 2 and reach into my NTFS Windows partition on HDD 1 and pull out all my documents and music, and put them in my home folder to be all, you know, Linuxy?

 

very easily with the ntfs-3g module

 

-Am I going to break, ruin, render useless, erase, burn, melt, or kill anything?

 

no, but if worried backup anything important prior to starting and ask questions here first or on our IRC channel (see my signature)

 

cheers

anyweb

[srr]

Hey anyweb

Thanks for the clear answers

 

Could you help me out with this one, though?

-If I have a Windows bootloader on the original HDD, and then GRUB or whatever was installed with Fedora on the new HDD, would they conflict? Could I even load an OS? 

both grub and windows bootloaders can be reinstalled by the respective os installation (or live) cd, having a bootloader won't stop you from loading an OS and even if it does you can always remove the bootloader.

What I'm confused about is this. The Windows bootloader can only start windows. GRUB can start both windows and linux, so obviously I'd want to use GRUB. So if I turn on the computer, I assume the windows boot loader would immediately be read because it is on the primary HDD. If this happens, there would be no opportunity to access GRUB, on the second HDD, because Windows would just load. Is this correct or am I confused?

So if I am correct, then I would want to remove the windows boot loader from the 1st HDD. If I did that, then the BIOS would find no boot loader on HDD 1 and then look at HDD 2 and find GRUB? Is that how it works?

 

If I uninstalled the Windows boot loader I don't know how I would get it back since I got windows preinstalled without a disk.

 

Thanks, just not quite understanding this concept.

[anyweb]

Hey anywebThanks for the clear answers

 

Could you help me out with this one, though?

<blockquote data-ipsquote="" class="ipsQuote" data-ipsquote-contentcommentid="12146" data-ipsquote-username="anyweb" data-cite="anyweb" data-ipsquote-contentapp="forums" data-ipsquote-contenttype="forums" data-ipsquote-contentid="3422" data-ipsquote-contentclass="forums_Topic"><div>
-If I have a Windows bootloader on the original HDD, and then GRUB or whatever was installed with Fedora on the new HDD, would they conflict? Could I even load an OS? 

both grub and windows bootloaders can be reinstalled by the respective os installation (or live) cd, having a bootloader won't stop you from loading an OS and even if it does you can always remove the bootloader.

What I'm confused about is this. The Windows bootloader can only start windows. GRUB can start both windows and linux, so obviously I'd want to use GRUB. So if I turn on the computer, I assume the windows boot loader would immediately be read because it is on the primary HDD. If this happens, there would be no opportunity to access GRUB, on the second HDD, because Windows would just load. Is this correct or am I confused?

</div></blockquote>
 

you are correct !

 

So if I am correct, then I would want to remove the windows boot loader from the 1st HDD. If I did that, then the BIOS would find no boot loader on HDD 1 and then look at HDD 2 and find GRUB? Is that how it works?

 

 

no, that is not how it works, the bios will only look to boot from bootable devices listed in the bios, and as regards which hdd it would boot from, it will be the Master hdd (the slave is the second hdd)

 

If I uninstalled the Windows boot loader I don't know how I would get it back since I got windows preinstalled without a disk. 

Thanks, just not quite understanding this concept.

 

 

what I would do if i was you is insert the second hdd as a slave drive (via jumpers on the hdd itself) then verify that you are booting fine into xp on the first drive, once you are happy that all is ok boot from your fedora dvd and choose to install to hdd, when it asks which hdd to install to use the second empty and new hdd, during the installation process it will ask you what boot loader to load, choose grub and grub will manage booting both to linux and xp.

 

cheers

anyweb

[srr]

Hey thanks again anyweb.

So my new HDD arrived yesterday (newegg rocks). I got Fedora 8 installed but am having two two issue right now.

 

1) GRUB lists 2 kernels and "other". I assume "other" is windows? In any case, I can't boot windows from GRUB, I have to manually boot from the slave in my BIOS. When I hit "other", nothing happens.

 

2) I have made probably 10 coasters trying to burn the full install dvd ISO for Fedora. All at different speeds, different software, different drive, different computers, different ISOs. The hashes say it's ok, so I don't know what's up. So since I couldn't use the DVD, I used the "lite" LiveCD version.

Here's the issue: While running the LiveCD, I could, with no problems, no configuring, get into my NTFS drive. Now that Fedora's installed, I get this when I double click on my first (windows) HDD.

 



 

This prompt WILL NOT ACCEPT my root password. It just jiggles and asks again. I can access my drive no problem from A) Booting into the liveCD or B)The installed copy, being logged in as root.

 

If someone could lend a hand that would be great, because this is important for me to be able to do. Also, and hints about why my ISOs can't burn would be good too.

[anyweb]

did you disable SELINUX ?

 

that might be causing your root error but i'm not sure

 

as regards the iso's try burn them on different media or verify the checksum.

[srr]

did you disable SELINUX ? 

that might be causing your root error but i'm not sure

 

as regards the iso's try burn them on different media or verify the checksum.

Hey anyweb

I just got PCLinuxOS a few days ago and couldn't be happier! For a n00b like me, it's like I'm using Windows with simply a new GUI. The linux-ness is almost invisible. Maybe if I eventually learn more about linux, I'll want to give Fedora another shot, but after using PCLinuxOS, I can see that Linux on the desktop could be a reality for more than 1% of people someday.

[anyweb]

well done ! glad to hear you found something that works for you :)

 

I've already covered PCLinuxOS right here on linux-noob.com and it's certaintly a fine distro especially for noobs

 

I did a 30 day coverage of my trials and tribulations with PCLinuxOS here

 

cheers

anyweb