Is Partition Magic still useful for a dual boot system?

[DoctorK 0]

In the "old days" of two/three years ago, I needed to use Partition Magic for a successful dual boot system of Mandrake 6.2 running Corel Office 2000 and Windows 98. I want to migrate to an open database by purchasing Mandrake 9.2 and the Pro Suite disk set. How good is 9.2 at coexisting with Windows and with being able to back up routinely as a mirror image to a second hard drive? Or, to put the question another way: Now that Symantec has purchased Power Quest's Partition Magic and Drive Image, does it make sense to continue to use these products if I want to have two hard drives that are mirror images of each other?

[Dapper Dan 0]

In the case of Mandrake, no. In the case of Red Hat, yes. Mdk has, what I believe to be the best partitioning tool out there. It is as simple to use as PM for resizing, partitioning to allow for Linux in a dual boot with Windows. With Red Hat in a dual boot scheme, I use PM to first resize Windows and create a blank space. Then I install RH into that space.

The part about hard drives being mirror images of each other, I'm not familiar enough with that to address it.

[danleff 0]

I'll mirror (pun intended) what Dapper Dan said about Mandrake's partitioning capabilities. PartitionMagic is always good to have around for disasters.

 

But this is an interesting question. I never tried this, but you peaked my interest.

 

So, Drive Image did mirror image the whole drive, including the Mandrake partition?

 

I also do not know about mirroring the drives using Linux/Mandrake, except for Linux only systems. Partimage is a linux package that will make a compressed file backup of the Linux partition, but I don't Know about a windows partition.

 

What I would do is ask the Mandrake folks, since you are considering buying their fine products. Perhaps they can shed some light on the request and point you in the right direction.