Dual Boot for Fedora Core 5 and Windows the easy way

As time goes by, the linux installations have been getting better about picking up other parbreastions that have other O-Ss installed (like BSD, Winblows, etc). But I recently did an install of Winblows XP and Fedora Core 5 that went together real nice. For those who want to have a nice dual boot setup for Linux and Windows - here's how to do it:

First, install Winblows XP. But as you prepare and format the disk, make two equal sized parbreastions on your hard drive (or set them up however you want 50-50, 60-40, 70-30....) making sure that you have Windows in the primary parbreastion and set the other parbreastion as extended and leave it 'raw' (don't format it). Install XP in the primary parbreastion and leave the other one alone for now. Once your Windows install looks good and works straight, then shut down the machine.

Next, grab your DVD of Fedora Core 5 and install it in the DVD drive. Allow that install to boot and come up to the install window. Answer the initial installation questions and then when it gets to the point in the installation where it asks about setting up drives, choose the radio button for 'custom' setup. What you'll 'customize' for this installation is the extended parbreastion where the Fedora Core 5 will reside. Allow the install to format the parbreastion and setup the SWAP parbreastion, too. Finally, select the boot manager as 'Grub' and make sure Grub is installed to the Master Boot Record (MBR). Then allow the install to grind away and complete.

Once the install completes, check the Fedora Core install to ensure it's working like it should. Next, check the Windows install by restarting the machine and hitting any key during the Fedora splash screen, select 'Other' and then allow your Windows installation to boot and then check it out. If everything is normal, you're done.

That's how it worked for me and it was pretty effortless - this should happen for just about any other distro (I started out with SUSE 10, then tried it with Mandriva, then Mandrake 10, then Fedora - Fedora was the winner for my wireless card setup. But they all setup very much alike and have great boot managers that allow both Linux and Windows to coexist on the same drive).

Have fun with it!