Printable View
You said, you'd be willing to spend a little money on software to back up your files, right? Well, go out and spend the money on a burner, they've really come down in price. You don't even have to get a super fast spiffy one. Just get something reasonable, so you can back up your data. And then feel free to use any software you feel comfortable using. Trust me, backing up your data will really easy your mind, and it also can be used later on.
you best bet is to defrag your drive. i prefer O&O defrager cause it seems to do a much better job that your standard windoes defrager. then use partition magic 7.0 or more and change the size of your primary partition and make it as small as you can
partition the unallocated space re-boot and copy all your files to the new partition. then using partition magic again, format your 'old' partition to your linux primiary and linux swap. then re-boot and istall linux. then once thats all done. move your files into your linux partition.
re-boot and format the non-linux partition and merge it into your linux partition. easy
(note: when formating partitions ect i recommend you use the boot disks you can make)
or you can run a dual boot like me.
I use a program similar to AciDriveHB. I it called VMWare. http://www.vmware.com
This program creates virtual bootable partitions within your current OS. For example, if you have WinXP, you install VMWare and then run it. You then create partitions any size that you like (within the limits of your actual hard drive space remaining) and then you can load *any* OS that you want. You can even load multiple OSes as I do. There are several modes of operation which include "bridge" mode where the OS will share settings from your current OS or you can have them as stand-alone where the OS builds everything as if it were the only OS on the box.
There is a slight performance hit with this product but it is well worth it as it is VERY reliable.
Hope this helps!
Yeah and in reference to what techtech said, you can now get a 48x burner for $44USD (including shipping) from http://www.newegg.com/app/viewProduc...82-007&depa=1. 700MB CD-R's are really cheap anymore, I just saw the local Best Buy (or was it Circuit City?) that were $9.99, the brand name was PNY. So really burner stuff is really cheap.
Plus you can use it for more than just backing up system files. You can create a "mix" audio CD of MP3 or other CD tracks that you like. I have used CD-R's for making my presentations at work portable and easy to give out to many people, so many choices!
And with having everything on a CD, now if you get a virus or crash your system or screw it up trying to make a partition, you'll be safe.
From personal experience, I have not had any problems with resizing a hard drive into a few different hard drives.... with or without having anything already on the physical drive. Though the very first time I ever played with Partition Magic, I totally wiped my entire life off my hard drive, and from there on I also made sure I had some sort of backup of my system.
<-- why he has a file server now!
Food for thought though, so many choices, just depends on the path you would like to take.