I am a linux newbie and I have recently bought a second hard drive to install linux on. I have never installed linux before and I would like some advice on which linux package would be the easiest to install.

maybe redhat, mandrake, or slackware

Thanks as far as the setup procedure goes once I have installed the package on my second hard drive how do I get to choose which os I want to boot into. I don't have much knowledge on the boot up methods of pc's and how it works when you have two hard drives.

when you install you will have a boot loader that will allow you to boot either one

just make sure you install the boot loader to the mbr and it will boot with a menu

Thanks again. As far as the term mbr(master boot record?) can anyone explain how does this work and where does it live? Does it live on the primary hard drive or the second?

it exists on both, the bios boots the first normally

Any PC-based hard drive, when partitioned and formatted with some filesystem, has an MBR. Each partition also has a boot sector. The code laid out in each of those areas depends entirely on the OS used to format that hard drive. Think of these areas as signposts that tell the system BIOS, the bootstrap loader, the boot manager, and the OS how the disk is laid out.

If you want to get into the technicals of what happens, there are places like the Operating System Resource Center that will describe things in great detail. I often refer to the OSRC, but I'm sure there are other resources on the 'net with similar good info. Many of these can be found by doing searches in google.com.