Removing a System Restore partition to make room for DOS?

Romanus81 · 10-23-2008, 11:45 AM

I have an MSI Wind laptop, currently dual booting Windows XP SP3 and Slackware Linux 12.1. My primary partitions are set as such:
1st is a Recovery Partition, Fat32
2nd is Windows XP
3rd is Slackware
4th is extended, w/ 1 partition linux swap, 2 storage, with one free.
I will probably install FreeDOS, but I have been told that it cannot be installed on a logical partition. Can I remove the Recovery Partition and put DOS on there? It has the file ntldr on it, I don't know if that is to boot the recovery program or to boot XP. When I tried chainloading in linux to that first partition it began the recovery program.
Can I safely format this partition to install DOS?
And if you are wondering why I want to install DOS, it is just so I can have the satisfaction of having DOS listed in my bootloader. I might use it to play games, and I know about DosBox and QEMU, but I really want to have dos listed in my bootloader and be able to use it for nothing other than bragging rights. I know it's pointless, but just humor me, please.

And yes, I have windows backed up on a separate hard drive, as well as a reinitialization CD.

10-23-2008, 11:45 AM	#1 (permalink)
Romanus81 Registered User Join Date: Jan 2008 Posts: 5 OS: Linux, Windos XP Media Center edition SP2	Removing a System Restore partition to make room for DOS? I have an MSI Wind laptop, currently dual booting Windows XP SP3 and Slackware Linux 12.1. My primary partitions are set as such: 1st is a Recovery Partition, Fat32 2nd is Windows XP 3rd is Slackware 4th is extended, w/ 1 partition linux swap, 2 storage, with one free. I will probably install FreeDOS, but I have been told that it cannot be installed on a logical partition. Can I remove the Recovery Partition and put DOS on there? It has the file ntldr on it, I don't know if that is to boot the recovery program or to boot XP. When I tried chainloading in linux to that first partition it began the recovery program. Can I safely format this partition to install DOS? And if you are wondering why I want to install DOS, it is just so I can have the satisfaction of having DOS listed in my bootloader. I might use it to play games, and I know about DosBox and QEMU, but I really want to have dos listed in my bootloader and be able to use it for nothing other than bragging rights. I know it's pointless, but just humor me, please. And yes, I have windows backed up on a separate hard drive, as well as a reinitialization CD. Last edited by Romanus81; 10-23-2008 at 11:50 AM.