[Help please] Installing Knoppix on Windows XP system

[jimcp]

A question about at which point I should start.

Current situation...
- XP Home Edition (up-to-date)
- One (1) NTFS HDD 80 Gb
- E:drive with CD R/W,
- D:drive with DVD R
- Booting Knoppix from E: works just fine, although the fact that I have (just?) one processor is reported as an error

Desired situation
- Dual Boot
- XP preferred OS
- 20Gb partition for Linux.
(In this I will install Tomcat, JBoss and a database most likely MySQL or Oracle 9i for J2EE compliant web application -deployment-)
- Performance is not an issue, it's the system for new release tests, etc.

I have no knowledge about physical HDD, exact differences between FAT16, FAT32. NTFS, more? I am used to work with operational unix systems. I have worked with a dual boot Windows2k, SuSe 7.1system a while back. I remember that I could read my Windows files from within SuSe. I have installed Oracle 9i on that system. The unix sysadmin prepared this system for me.

Now I have to do the job by myself. I do NOT know HOW-TO
- split 80Gb NTFS -> 60Gb NTFS + 20Gb FAT32
(I assume Unix does NOT work on NTFS)
For software I have the new PowerQuest Partition Magic 8, correct choice? Haven't got a clue how it works though. It's still in the box.

I am looking for pointers, links to HOW-TO pages. Reports from people who went to the same process. I know things can go wrong real bad.

Anyone knows if System Recovery on Windows XP works in this kind of drastic system changes?

Any help is appreciated.

Kind Regards,
jCp

[rickenbacherus]

A question about at which point I should start.

Current situation...
- XP Home Edition (up-to-date)
- One (1) NTFS HDD 80 Gb
- E:drive with CD R/W,
- D:drive with DVD R
- Booting Knoppix from E: works just fine, although the fact that I have (just?) one processor is reported as an error

boot: knoppix lang=us nosmp

Desired situation
- Dual Boot
- XP preferred OS
- 20Gb partition for Linux.
(In this I will install Tomcat, JBoss and a database most likely MySQL or Oracle 9i for J2EE compliant web application -deployment-)
- Performance is not an issue, it's the system for new release tests, etc.

I have no knowledge about physical HDD, exact differences between FAT16, FAT32. NTFS, more? I am used to work with operational unix systems. I have worked with a dual boot Windows2k, SuSe 7.1system a while back. I remember that I could read my Windows files from within SuSe. I have installed Oracle 9i on that system. The unix sysadmin prepared this system for me.

Now I have to do the job by myself. I do NOT know HOW-TO
- split 80Gb NTFS -> 60Gb NTFS + 20Gb FAT32
(I assume Unix does NOT work on NTFS)
For software I have the new PowerQuest Partition Magic 8, correct choice? Haven't got a clue how it works though. It's still in the box.

I am looking for pointers, links to HOW-TO pages. Reports from people who went to the same process. I know things can go wrong real bad.

Anyone knows if System Recovery on Windows XP works in this kind of drastic system changes?

Any help is appreciated.

Kind Regards,
jCp

I would suggest this:

1)Use an open source app like Mondo to make a copy of your existing installation. You can restore it exactly as it is in the event that gets hosed.

2)Leave partition magic in the box for now. Boot knoppix, and sudo qtparted. There may be some issues resizing NTFS. IT seems to be a common problem (don't know myself). FWIW - I have also heard several stories about partition magic hosing some drives.

3)Resize your NTFS partition. With the remainig 20G I personally would make three partitions for Linux: 3500 MB / (root) -ext3 filesystem
7500GB /home partition -ext3 filesystem
1GB /swap (not essential but nice to have),
8G (shared between OS's) -FAT32 filesystem

There's really no right or wrong way to partition a drive. You're just dividing it into smaller sized drives (virtually speaking). You should do whatever works best for you.

After you get your NTFS partition resized, make the new partitions according to predetermined sizes. When you do an installation of Knoppix with sudo knoppix-installer you will be allowed to specify which partition to use for /root and /swap. It will also set up dual boot for you. Just be sure to answer 'yes' to "Install LILO to MBR?"
After installation you can copy your /home directory to the partition that you created for it. (There is a how-to) Hopefully this feature will soon be implemented in the install script. Here's some info about partitions and partitioning.

[jimcp]

Some fast reply! Thanks. (Oracle would call this Gold Support.) I don't care how I reach my destination as long as I get there in a reasonable time with as few accidents as possible during the journey.

I understand it as follows:
* backup with Mondo. (If it does what I think it does then that alone would be a =great= find. I am not happy -at all- with my current recovery procedure. All these windows backup and recovery 'tools' assume you will be able to start the tool. It's the same as leaving your recovery how-to docs on the system.
Step 1) Download Mondo. Install. And...test! Scary, but fun.

* You write

Boot knoppix, and sudo qtparted. There may be some issues resizing NTFS. IT seems to be a common problem (don't know myself). FWIW - I have also heard several stories about partition magic hosing some drives.

Do you mean boot it like I have done before, just by inserting the CD? It seems you are unsure about this procedure. PM 8has millions of users. It's commercial and supported. The w2k / SuSe setup has been done with PM release 7. I want to keep it a Windows system. I would not be happy with Linux dependencies. I'll investigate a little bit futher here.

* The filesystems you write

7500GB /home partition -ext3 filesystem

I particularly like this step! As agreed we keep the utility you send me through pm a secret.

I have some work to do hey? I feel much better but still not 100%. The ideal response would be: I have it running on XP, this is how I did it.
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Thank you very much for your help,
Jim

[rickenbacherus]

Some fast reply! Thanks. (Oracle would call this Gold Support.) I don't care how I reach my destination as long as I get there in a reasonable time with as few accidents as possible during the journey.

I understand it as follows:
* backup with Mondo. (If it does what I think it does then that alone would be a =great= find. I am not happy -at all- with my current recovery procedure. All these windows backup and recovery 'tools' assume you will be able to start the tool. It's the same as leaving your recovery how-to docs on the system.
Step 1) Download Mondo. Install. And...test! Scary, but fun.

Mondo is already on the Knoppix cd.

* You write

Boot knoppix, and sudo qtparted. There may be some issues resizing NTFS. IT seems to be a common problem (don't know myself). FWIW - I have also heard several stories about partition magic hosing some drives.

Do you mean boot it like I have done before, just by inserting the CD? It seems you are unsure about this procedure. PM 8has millions of users. It's commercial and supported.

Hmm- the same is true of windows - millions of users and supported and yet which OS is it that has more holes than a bullet riddled tin can? Oh yeah........not LInux.

The w2k / SuSe setup has been done with PM release 7. I want to keep it a Windows system. I would not be happy with Linux dependencies. I'll investigate a little bit futher here.

I wasn't suggesting anything to the contrary- you can still boot windows just fine.
I'm not unsure of how to run qtparted just unsure of its ability to resize NTFS.

I have some work to do hey? I feel much better but still not 100%. The ideal response would be: I have it running on XP, this is how I did it.
- 1
- 2
-
- N

Thank you very much for your help,
Jim

Well.........you won't get that kind of response from me! Plain and simple- wimpdoze has nothing to offer me. I do however multi-boot 2,3 or more Linux distros regularly. I'd suggest perhaps getting on irc.freenode.net #knoppix and talking to some people there who have the (mis)fortune of dual booting w/ XP.

[jimcp]

Hi,

Mondo is super! It's embarrassing that I didn't know about this tool. I would have suggested Symantec tools.

<OFF TOPIC>
For Java development I will go Open Source only. Netbeans is slowly becoming a mature IDE and the Java VM is getting faster and less buggy with every release. If I find a Java replacement for a Windows program I am using I replace it. It's nice to be able to look in the sources of your programs.
</OFF TOPIC>

I feel much more relaxed with your proposed solution now that you added your comments. English is not my native language (I assume people see this right away but in e-mail people tend to care less about errors in your writing. I do believe that e-mail has a lot of noise, add the noise the technical jargon adds and the language barrier of course. At least some information gets lost.

I didn't mean that I had doubts about your knowledge in any way, just that this whole operation is rather important for me. Upgrading Java froim 1.4.1_02 amd Netbeans form 3.4.1 to 3.5 with a so called co-bundle package ruined about everything I had installed. The netbeans userlists are not particularly friendly. It took me three days of 18 to 20 hours to do this upgrade. I learned many lessons from it.

I don't expect a "smooth" Knoppix install (although I was --very-- surprised how well it booted and recognized everything) but this time I will be much better prepared. I hope for no reason at all.

Thanks again for your support.