>I've just purchased a Dell Inspiron 8100 notebook computer with Windows 2000 Professional. It's got a 48GB hard drive as one large FAT32 partition, with an assortment of preinstalled programs, including Office XP Professional. Before I install a few dozen additional apps on this machine, including various incarnations of FoxPro, I would like to plan the most sensible sequence of steps. Here are some of my questions and concerns:
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>- should I repartition the hard drive before doing any installations, and if so how?
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>If it's unnecessary or can be done later without reinstalling everything, I would love to punt this issue for now. Is it likely that I will end up needing to go back to square one if I don't do something about reformatting and/or partitioning up front? Also I'm confused about exactly how to go about creating a new partition under Win2K Pro, and whether a separate "logical drive" would suffice for most purposes. It's unclear whether I can create additional "extended partitions" (or any other type of partition) at this point without reinstalling everything that came preinstalled on the machine.
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>- should I install Norton utils before anything else?
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>I've got a complete set of Norton utility packages, including both Norton Internet Security and Norton SystemWorks (which includes Norton Ghost). I'm very concerned about taking precautions to avoid the likelihood of EVER having to do a complete reinstall. Should I install Norton SystemWorks first (to get Ghost), and would it be best to have created a separate drive partition (or logical drive) before that step? Should I install Norton Internet Security first, to be sure I can safely get live updates?
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>- does it matter what sequence I use to install versions of FoxPro?
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>I will want to install FPD2.6, FPW2.6, VFP3.0b, VFP5 (maybe), VFP6, and eventually VFP7 on this machine. Is it necessary do these installations in sequence? Is there much chance of problems if I install an older version of FoxPro after a newer one (assuming I use separate directories, of course)? More generally, how likely is it that installing older apps after newer ones will cause problems that would have been avoided by adhering to an installation sequence that starts with oldest apps first?
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>- any other tips, e.g. should I disable write cache on the hard disk?
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>The Dell Inspiron machine came with Write cache enabled on the hard disk, which seems risky, especially with a FAT-based file system. Should I disable write caching to reduce the risk of major corruption that might necessitate a complete reinstallation?
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>Thanks in advance for any advice on all of this.

Michael,
You already have good advices. Few additions :
-Think of NTFS soon. It's not true you would have problems connecting from win9x machines. I have 2 partitions where one is FAT32 and win9x installed (dual boot). Sensitive data is on NTFS. I can connect to any one from anywhere (including remote from notebook -win9x- that's generally at home). NTFS is for security + its cluster size is 512K by default (1/8th of min possible on FAT32).
-Write caching on win2K is 'reset' to ON with each boot. It's a bug or feature of win2K and you better set it manually to OFF on each boot.
Cetin