OK i am wanting to reformat my hd and runa dual boot
win2k one first half and linux (of some flavor ) on the other side.
can anyone suggest a good way to do this and what flavor of linux to install?

What? Who said that?
NightOwl 17381225

yes full information, like not to breif.

also is there a way to do it without reformatting on a fat32 file system..... like some way to make a partition that is ntfs format after you already have the whole drive running fat32?

thats easy install win2k then install mandrake 8
wa la you have dualboot with win2k & linux

I had it set up with XP & mandrake 8 but now that box only has mandrake on it

I'd recommend Debian. It's a bit tricky to install, and not as newbie-friendly as mandrake, but excellent in use. In this case, it's better to install win first and then debian (otherwise windows will overwrite debain's boot sector with it's own).

good question. i think in the end it just comes from trying them all and seeing what unix flavor and setup that you end up liking the most.
i've done both dual and triple boots w/ win2k/redhat/and FreeBSD. they are all different and cool. at the moment i'm running Red Hat 7.1 and Win2k on my laptop here. RH7.1 is an amazingly painless install w/ no problems w/ any of the hardware. but i really think all the flavors are on par w/ each other, more of just what you're familiar w/ i would guess. though i'm certainly not a zen master on the subject. just what i took a liking to.
Here is a link to an article that was very helpful in getting the dual boot running w/ win2k an linux w/ the win2k bootloader. it really is quite easy.

How would you do a dualboot of Mandrake 8 and 98se w/o reforamting?

install mandrake it will make the boot screen for you it's very easy

will i have to partition?

yes I would not sure if you have to but I have alway put it on a diffent partition