New HDD, new OS...help

mauro

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May 12, 2004
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I have a Gygabite P35-DS3 S motherboard, with 4 SATA II connectors. I currently have a 400GB WD hard-drive, on which i'm running Windows XP. I would like to buy another hard-drive, and I'd like a 640GB / 1TB HDD (it seems stupid to pay 10-50$ less for ANOTHER 400GB).
On this new HDD, is it possible to partition it in 2 pieces (let's say 400 + 240) so that: my current XP will see 2 400 GB HDD's and to format the remaining 240GB to an EXT3 FS in order to install a Linux on it? I know this may sound stupid, but this configuration would really suit me best (so that I extend the capacity of my current XP File System - games, movies etc. and to run Linux 'cause I need it for my diploma project).

Another option would be to install the Linux on the whole 640GB (but that would mean no more torrents on Windows :) ). But how would this work (each time I open my computer, I would be asked in which OS I want to boot in?).

I don't want to create a EXT3 partition on my current HDD / use Virtualization software. Thanks a lot for any kind of help!
 
You will need to use some 3rd party software to be able to choose between OSes at boot up.

Vista has this built in, but not XP as far as I know.

There are several open source boot managers at sourceforge, or you can check your specific Linux distro boards for recommendations.