nweissma

This question should be simple to the gurus.

i have vista-32 on a 1TB C:\. i also have a 500GB D:\ and 2 external hdd's.

I want to install FreeBSD, fedora, and Mandriva -- and possibly another after i have enough experience to know what i want.

• how should i distribute the OS's amongst the drives?
• how can i choose the os to boot from (at power-up)? can i use my a:\ floppy for this? do i need an external optical reader?

devils casper

10-15 GB space is enough for each Linux distro. Create one 1GB SWAP Partition and share it in all Linux distros. Create one ext3 partition for each Linux distro.

* 1 GB SWAP
* 10-15 GB ext3 for / of every Linux distro.

You don't have to do anything special for multiboot. Each distro will install its boot loader ( GRUB ) and it will take care of startup options. There is no need of Floppy or external reader.

I would suggest you to create partitions through GParted Partition Manager. Its interface in user friendly and you can create/delete/shrink partitions easily. Its available in LiveCDs of most of Linux distros. Install Fedora first because its installer doesn't detect other installed Linux distros.

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