XP messing with linux partitions?

[Kam Leo]

On 6/4/07, Mike McCarty <Mike.McCarty at sbcglobal.net> wrote:
> Andras Simon wrote:
> > I used gparted from the Fedora 7 Live cd to create several partitions
> > on my hd; sda1 for  XP, the others for various Fedoras.(I used the
> > Live cd for this so that I could also use badblocks on the linux
> > partitions and label them.) After installing XP in its partition and
> > then booting the Live cd again, fdisk showed one less partition (the
> > original sda2, a small boot partition, was gone), parted complained
> > about overlapping partitions, and gparted didn't show any.
>
> [snip]
>
> > So my question really is: is there something to keep in mind when
> > partitioning a drive for XP/Fedora dual boot?
>
> I am not an XP install expert. However, this is what I have observed,
> FWIW.
>
> Most Microsoft products act as if they are going to be the
> only program which does any particular task, and cheerfully set
> themselves to be the default, or even the only, program for that task.
> WinXP is no exception to this rule. I believe WinXP creates a
> "rescue partition" in which it saves certain information so that,
> should things get mess up badly, it can get back to a bootable
> state. This may be the problem.
>
> I'd go back to a state in which there was NO MBR, zero it out,
> and then create the WinXP partition, and install WinXP. Only
> after WinXP was happy, bootable, runs, and has left some unused
> space on the disc, would I try to install Linux.
>
> HTH
>
> Mike

This good advice and should be applied to all versions of Windows, not just XP.