How to make Dual Booting Windows Vista and Linux

Assuming that you are doing a fresh install:

• First install Windows Vista on your system.
• After the Windows Vista install, we start with the Linux installation.

Please make sure not to resize the Vista partition during the installation of the Linux distribution! Due to changes in NTFS versions, current Linux partitioning program, no standard Windows partitioning programs can properly alter the partition that Vista is installed on.

Select GRUB as the bootloader to be installed. After completing the install we will be able to boot into Linux only as the MBR will be overwritten.

Now we need to modify the bootmenu to add an entry for Windows Vista.

For this we will edit the file "/boot/grub/menu.lst". To add an entry for Windows Vista, we need to add the following lines at the end of the file.

If Vista is installed on 1st partition 1st IDE hard drive:

title         "Windows Vista"
root         (hd0,0)
chainloader      +1

If Vista is installed on 1st partition 1st SATA/SCSI hard drive:

title         "Windows Vista"
root         (sd0,0)
chainloader      +1

Depending on your Vista Setup, you can modify the above code. The only area that should need modification is the line that starts with "root". The item that will likely need modification is the drive and partition information.

Save the file and restart your system to see the new bootmenu.