I am wanting to put Fedora on my laptop that currently runs XP. I want to do a dual boot, thus I need to create a new partition. Here's the problem:

In XP, when I go to computer management, it shows that the entire hard drive has only 1 partition. There are 20 gigs of free space.

I have a bootable dvd with QtParted. When I run qtparted, it shows that I have essentially zero free space, so there I am unable to resize the partition. What gives? Why would windows show that I have 20 gigs free yet QtParted shows zero free space?

I am a major newbie just trying to join the 21st century so any help is appreciated.

QtParted will show as free space only the unpartitioned space on the drive.
Your 20 gigs free space belongs to Windows partition? If so, I would resize the Windows partition (usually I use Partition Magic for this), and let the rest of the space to be partitioned during the install process of the Linux distro.

Thanks for the help. I'll give it a shot with partition magic.

Hello...check out this link ...it has a good guide on dual boot,windows and mepis.You should be able to use it for your install I hopehttp://www.mepisguides.com/install/install-dual-drives/Install-with-dual-boot-and-clear.html

good luck,Linux rocks(Mepis sure does)And they have an awesome forum with lots of knowledgable guys who like to help(Mepis lovers is the name)
Check it out :mrgreen: