XP messing with linux partitions?

[Kam Leo]

On 6/4/07, Jonathan Berry <berryja at gmail.com> wrote:
> 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 have never seen it do that before (XP setup creating a
> recovery/rescue partition).  I have only installed XP a couple times,
> and have not installed from an SP2 disk, but I do not think this is
> the case.  If it is, it must be a new feature on an SP2 install disk.
> I'm pretty sure the rescue partitions on new computers are put there
> by the OEMs, not XP.
>
> I know I have created a single partition with fdisk for Windows and
> told the install to use just that partition and not do anything else
> (the rest of the disk was unused) and that worked just fine.
>
> Of course, in none of this am I refuting your assertion that XP
> assumes it is the only OS that will ever grace the surface of your
> hard disks :-).
>
> Jonathan

If you blow away that partition the restoration CD will not work. The
Windows XP CD shipped with new boxes is not a retail version. It will
not install without the restoration partition. If you want to return
to XP or sell the computer with XP at a later date save the partition
to other media; e.g. CD/DVD,