COMPUTERS

The typical Linux desktop today looks a lot like a Windows desktop.

DUAL BOOTING LINUX
AND WINDOWS XP
Turn your PC into a switch-hitter the easy way,
with a LiveCD. By Mark R. Brown

That voice in your head knows that you won’t get real geek satisfaction unless you’re running Linux, but your practical side knows that you need your favorite Windows applications (read: games). So what can you do? You dual boot. You install both Linux and Windows XP.

Are your palms sweating? You’ve probably heard horror stories about hard drive repartitioning, data loss, and configuration nightmares, but if you take a few precautions, it can be easy.

 

NOTE: This tutorial covers dual booting with a single hard disk. Setting up separate disks for XP and Linux requires a more convoluted procedure.

Step 1: Pick a Linux Distribution

You know there are at least a million Linux distributions, right? Red Hat. Mandrake. Debian. The names all run together, and each one comes on seven or eight CDs, and takes days to install.

Not necessarily. You don’t need a full Linux distribution yet. You want a LiveCD, a distro that runs from a single CD that you can boot from and try out before committing to a full installation.

There’s a list of LiveCD distros at frozentech.com/ content/ livecd.php, sortable by platform and function. You want one that supports x86 hardware, and is listed as Desktop and OS Replacement.