Hello all. I'm an absolute beginner with Linux and want to install Ubuntu 9.04. I have no problems using Ubuntu live cd, or installing Ubuntu on the same hard drive as XP (XP prior installed) or installing Ubuntu on a dedicated hard drive but I want to install Ubuntu on a slave drive (Pata).

I've searched for INFO but so far have only come up with options to install Ubuntu on the master drive.

Can someone direct me to instructions please.

Thanks

T.C.I do not have a copy of Ubuntu to refer to so I will be doing this from memory.
As I do not know the specifications of your computer I will try and give you all the options.
Boot from the live CD, answer the usual questions about language etc, when you come to the install to hard drive, if you have a SATA drive as WELL as a PATA drive then you are looking for a drive listed as hda1 to install to,select hda1,(the SATA drive will be listed as sda1-sda2-etc), select USE ENTIRE DISK and accept the default fomatting and away you go.
If you have two PATA DRIVES, you need to select hda2 and again use entire disk.
When it comes to the MBR you need to select either the SATA drive to install it to or if you have two PATA drives you need to install it to hda1
After struggling for three DAYS finally dual-boot is successful. It didn't quite follow your suggestions, despite the hdd's being identical Pata drives (Eide) the are referred to as Sda not Hda and I couldn't use the entire second disk as the installer kept giving the warning that a swap file had not been allocated. Then I got bogged down with the error message "No root file system is defined".

MBR was not displayed in ORDER to make a selection, the Grub loader installer seemed to auto detect the XP operating system and create the dual boot selection.

I selected / as the mount point, as yet uncertain what the various mount point possibilities are so will be doing a lot more reading.

Many thanks for your nudge in the right direction.

T.C.