A computer issue, how should I deal with this? Best solution?

[Doug Sutherland]

I would suggest a dual boot configuration like this:

Create a windows ntfs partition for winxp.
Create a windows fat32 partition for data.
Create a linux ext3 partition for linux root filesystem
Create one or more linux ext3 partitions for linux data
Create a linux swap partition.

Never store anything you want to save in the winxp
or linux root partitions. This way if you ever need to
reinstall either you leave your data partitions alone 
and never lose anything important.

The windows fat32 data partition can be mounted in
linux so you can move files to and from windows. 
Note that ntfs is read only in linux so best to use fat32
for this partition.

Make one of the linux data partitions the /home mount.
I usually make a small partition for /home but a large 
one, actually several, for data. I also usually create a 
separate /usr/local partition for software I compile from
source to add to the original distro, but that's not really
necessary. The reason I do it is so its easy to save stuff
that might have taken a while to figure out when adding
extra software.

For the bootloader config, set winxp to be the default 
boot, linux as the second choice. If you use a timeout 
then it will automatically start winxp for your father. 
If you don't want to use timeout, just tell him to pick 
winxp from the boot menu always.

There is also the possibility of using vmware but I am 
finding that vmware is getting to be a performance 
problem lately, at least with the new free versions. 
Best to have a dual boot into native os and then you 
can still add some vmware on either or both winxp
or linux in addition to the dual boot.

I used to have a laptop setup that could dual boot into
native win2k or linux, but could also run linux inside 
vmware on win2k, that was really nice. It used the 
vmware workstation 5, which seemed to be much 
better than the free vmware server that they give away.

Another suggestion: create a rescue partition, and set
up a small linux system with speech enabled, add this
to your boot menu. If you ever have problems with 
the other bootables, you can boot into that and then
mount other drives to make any necessary changes. 
If you boot into the rescue partition you can chroot
into the regular linux root filesystem if its not booting.

  -- Doug