Here are the steps to get a successful dual boot on your Dell netbook. I successfully used these steps on a Dell Vostro V90.

The order in which you format the drive and install the operating systems is the most important aspect. In a nutshell, we’re going to prepare a flash drive with the OS X installer. Then use the OS X flash drive to boot up the netbook and partition the drive using Disk Utility. Then boot the netbook off our Win XP CD and install Windows. Finally, we install Mac OS X. The following steps should get you headed in the right direction.

Requirements:

• Knowledge of installing Mac OS X and Windows is required.
• External USB CD-ROM drive for Windows XP installation.

1. Follow this guide to prepare your flash drive with the Mac OS X installer.

2. Return to here after preparing your flash drive. Don’t install OS X yet.

3. Boot your netbook off of the OS X flash drive.

4. Launch Disk Utility

5. Partition your disk with the following:

• Volume Scheme: 2 partitions
• Partition 1 Name: Mac
• Partition 1 Format: Mac OS Extended (Journaled)
• Partition 1 Size: 8.3gb (minimum size)
• Partition 2 Name: UNTITLED
• Partition 2 Format: MS-DOS FAT32
• Options: GUID

Note: On my particular netbook I was working with a 16gb drive. I found that a 8.3gb Mac partition was the minimum size that would allow Mac OS X to install and leave some space for a few applications and data storage. With all options unchecked, a little over 3gb was available after Mac OS X was installed.

This left roughly 6.7gb allocated for the Windows XP partition. This enough for Windows, Microsoft Office and some other basic applications. About 1-2gb of free space. Just enough to get by.

If you’re working with anything larger than 16gb then you can make your partitions larger.

6. Make a note of your MS-DOS partition size.

7. Reboot your netbook after you’ve partitioned your disk with the above settings. Don’t install OS X yet.

8. Boot your netbook off of your Windows XP CD.

9. Format your MS-DOS partition and install Windows XP.

Note: Be very careful to select the appropriate MD-DOS partition from the list. You should be able to decipher which partition to select based on the size you noted when using Disk Utility.

10. After installing Windows XP, boot your netbook off of the Mac OS X flash drive you created earlier.

11. Select the ‘Mac’ partition as the destination and deselect all options under Customize.

12. Install Mac OS X.

Done!

Good luck! Please post feedback in the comments below.