Installing a copy of windows for certain games, pls help!

[webnukem]

Hi! I recently installed fedora core3, and I am very happy with it! I was planning on using linux exclusively, but unfortunately an online rpg that I play regularly will not work under cedega on my system. So, I need to put a copy of windows onto my computer.. Here is the problem

When I installed linux, I used the entire hard drive, and the file system is apparently incompatible with windows', which means I cannot even boot from the windows xp cd to set up partitioning, etc.

One person suggested that I reformat my entire hard drive (including this fedora install that I am using right now), and installing windows xp first, and then linux on top of that.

I would prefer to keep this install of fedora, but if it comes down to it, I would be willing to install windows and then linux on top of it.

What I am asking of the all-knowing forum regulars is, is there any way to create a 10 gb or so blank partition that would let me install a copy of windows xp WITHOUT sacrificing my current install of fedora?

Any help GREATLY appreciated, thanks so much

-marsupial

[adam7979]

depends......

you mentioned that you've used up the whole hard disk for FC3, how did you partition your hard disk then?

if you have a whole hard disk (say 10G) dedicated to / and some 200 MB for swap, then you probably have to run GNU parted or something to adjust the partition size.

say if you have 3GB for /usr 3GB for / 4GB for /home then you might want to consider to copy whatever in /home into /, then modify /etc/fstab accordingly, and delete /home partition. (depends on your situation, plan carefully)

after you've done the above, do the following in shell prompt:

dd if=/dev/hda of=/root/linux.bot bs=512 count=1

and copy linux.bot into a floppy or thumbdrive or CD or any other offline media, then proceed to install Windows XP into the 4GB you "created" earlier.

finally, copy the linux.bot into your so called "C drive" and modify boot.ini to read like below:

[boot loader]
timeout=3
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOW S
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINNT="Microso ft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect
c:\linux.bot="Fedora Core 3"

(do not change the the "(1)", leave it as it is)


just as a reference, again, plan carefully

hope this helps