Dual booting from an external HDD

Gazdaman · I did a trackday!!! Joined: 12 Aug 2004 Karma :

Ok, here's the situation, I have a small form factor Dell PC with FreeBSD on it and an 80gig HDD.

I want to use that PC, since it's a good spec, but I want to dual boot XP.

Ok, 80gigs isn't really enough space for me. And the PC only has enough space for one internal HDD.

I have a good 20gigs of mp3s/movies on it, maybe I should just move those to an external HDD and then just have the 2 OSs on the 80gig.

Do I need to dual boot? I was thinking for things like using my scanner, and iTunes etc. Things that may just be a pain in the ass in unix.

I could just keep my XP pc under the desk and use my monitor switchbox if/when I need it...

Any views? Tips?

Gaz

NSR Mick · World Chat Champion Joined: 26 Jun 2005 Karma :

Dual boot it its pretty easy to configure if you install Windows 1st then Linux and use grub as your boot loader, thats how i do it on my laptop.
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Lawnie · Nearly there... Joined: 23 Apr 2006 Karma :

Is your external HDD connected via USB 1.1 or 2.0? If it's the former, you might find that the performance of the OS will be severely hindered by the limited bandwidth of the interface. If it uses FireWire instead, it'll be fast enough regardless of which baud rate.

I have a dual boot system - Windows XP and C:\ and Windows 2000 on D:\. The reason for doing so was because some applications that I use hate XP. It really is easy to do Thumbs Up

You'll be asked during the system boot which OS you wish to use. Depending on your BIOS, it will automatically default to the first OS after x seconds, if you haven't manually made a selection.

Gazdaman · I did a trackday!!! Joined: 12 Aug 2004 Karma :

I'm just worried that 80gig isn't enough for 2 OSs, especially bloaty windows. And 20gigs of Mp3s.

Gaz

Lawnie · Nearly there... Joined: 23 Apr 2006 Karma :

XP only needs 1.5GB of space to install, apparently. How much storage space do you have remaining on your existing hard disk (including music, etc)?

NSR Mick · World Chat Champion Joined: 26 Jun 2005 Karma :

I like to keep my data away from my os and with all the apps and docs installed on my laptop it uses 17gb. Thumbs Up

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If you dont like the way that I ride.......Stop trying to keep up!!!

Gazdaman · I did a trackday!!! Joined: 12 Aug 2004 Karma :

On another vein, what are the limitations of using solely unix?

How easy to use is wine? And is it the answer to all my compatibility problems? If I can IRC, browse internet, ftp, photoshop (or similar) use my scanner and iPod. Then I'm happy enough.

I think some kind of word processor aswell. Think that comes with gnome aswell which is compiling now.

For XP only emergencies I'll still have the windows box.

Gaz

EuropeanNC30R... · Gay Hairdresser Joined: 20 Jun 2002 Karma :

Wine is sloooooow, wouldn't fancy it for anything really cpu intensive, unless you have a brute of a PC.

senna_f4 · Scooby Slapper Joined: 04 Apr 2006 Karma :

Gazdaman · I did a trackday!!! Joined: 12 Aug 2004 Karma :

Is there something photoshop est-que for *nix?

I think I will use the server (BSD) as my main PC, and anything I desperately need windows for I'll just utilise my monitor switchbox.

Gaz

senna_f4 · Scooby Slapper Joined: 04 Apr 2006 Karma :

The Gimp https://www.gimp.org/
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