Hi, I know this is not really server-related, but....

Last time I installed linux was when I was running windows 98, I knew that then, i could install windows first, then install linux.

IF i messed up i could just re install, and I would not have any booting problems, lilo would come up. Well, I now run XP, and I haven't really installed linux again. I need to do some testing, experimenting, and I don't have servers just lying around for me to test on and end up re instaling. I thought it would be a good idea to test things on my home box, if i mess up, just re install myself.

Does RedHat support XP ? Will I be able to just install redhat off the cd (7.2) and have it so when I boot up my computer it will have some sort of menu as to what os i want?

And let's pretend I want to totally get rid of linux after that, how would I make the menu disappear?

Could someone clarify this up for me :confused:

Oh yeah

I don't have a floppy drive
=(

Yes Linux will co-exist with XP. However I would highly recommend using LILO with 7.2 for your dual boot system. I have found that using GRUB tends to take over the MBR and wont let it go unless you wipe out the whole drive using a NIX based fdisk. I had this happen with a Linux / Win2K system and even the DOS Fdisk would not get rid of GRUB. The only way I got it off the drive was formatting it with Fdisk in FreeBSD. I dont have dual boot systems any longer but I am sure if you check out the Lilo man pages it will tell you how to get rid of LILO if it is no longer needed without wiping the entire drive.

If you ever have a problem where LILO overwrites your MBR, all you need to do is boot off of the winxp/2000 cd, go to recovery console, and then type in "fdisk /mbr" or "fix mbr". The list of recovery commands are availabe in help. I have had this happen multiple times. I was always able to fix it using fdisk /mbr. However, GRUB is just dangerous. It messed up things pretty bad. Had to reformat. Mandrake and SUSE are better about boot options though.

Same darn thing happened to me DigitalX. Anyway.. ya, just use LILO and you should be fine.

I'm glad to see I am not the only one that GRUB has haunted. I have never seen something that absolutely will not let the disk go like that.. Well I know how to get rid of it now, but for the above I would highly recommend LILO, I never even thought about the Fix MBR command, that is actually probably the easiest way to get rid of it if you are using W2k or XP. Thanks for the tip :D