upgrade dual-boot box - how do I back up linux partition?

[Mr Reaney]

I want to upgrade from 98 to 2k on my dual-boot box, but microshaft prevent me from doing so while there's 2 OSs on the box. WTF do I do to back up the data on the linux partition? I could reinstall Linux, but I don't want to go through THAT again (newbie agony).
I have a 300MB (don't laugh) HD which is spare - would that be a useful tool for backups (I have source media, all I need to keep is the Xserver setup and sound, all else seems standard from install).

PS spending money is not an option this year...

[bdg1983]

300mb hd? :D :D :D Just kidding.

What exactly is preventing you from installing W2K? How are your partitions currently setup as we may be able to help you get W2K installed without worrying about losing Linux.

[Mr Reaney]

Well...

I have w98 installed on the primary FAT32 partition, and Linux on an ext2 partition. I use a boot manager to load them.

When I boot in windows and use the w2k disk to upgrade, it runs various checks and then asks if I want to change to NTFS, which I do, so "Y".

Shortly after this, I am told that the upgrade is not possible, due to the multiple FSs on the disk.

What do you think now? I haven't tried it without the NTFS rewrite, but I'd like to change the FS because I'll never get my hands on another NTFS disk that I can play with otherwise.

[bdg1983]

I guess you have no choice but to use the spare drive to backup whatever you need from Linux.

Is there a filesystem on this spare drive already? If not, then there are a couple of NHF's that explain how to create a ext2 filesystem and then to mount the drive. After that, just copy over what you want to keep.

Have you tried deleting the fat32 partition and then booting from the W2K cd? You should be able to install W2K while having Linux on the hd.