Installing Linux and XP...

I'm planning to buy a Compal HEL80 without an OS. I would like to install both Linux (possibly Ubuntu) and Windows XP on the computer. According to my friend, the general process for accomplishing this would be something like...

1. Make a partition using Partition Magic or a LiveCD.
2. Install Windows XP on this partition.
3. Install Ubuntu on the rest of the drive.

Is this correct?

Also, is there any stuff that I should beware of?

 

Don't use Ubuntu i tried it and it gave me lots of problems and I lost a hard drive because of that. If you are using a live cd that is fine but it takes very long to load.

 

Once the partaions and XP installed Install Boot Magic to manage which OS you want to boot from.

Also MS has released VirtualPC to Free Downloads. But requires XP Pro. This may be another option with out dealing with a boot manager. May users if failed to get it right the first Time and looses their MBR. So make sure you have the needed utility to recover.

I would recommend creating a small 100meg DOS (FAT32) partition at the start of the drive. This can be used to house Boot magic and other dos utilities. And for data transfer if needed.

 

first i would partition the hard drive with fdisk from a linux live cd, in my case i have 20 gig xp, 20 gig linux, rest other partitions (data, mp3, games)
then install xp first in the 20 gigs
after you have everything installed with windows it's time to install linux
boot with kubuntu dvd (if you want to install kubuntu), then you can choose to partition the 20 gigs reserved for linux in any way you want (create swap /boot and / partitions)
after you have kubuntu installed, go to /boot/grub and edit menu.lst and add your windows xp partition, so you can boot what you want
if you want to backup the mbr you can use a program called mbrutil.exe or mbrutild.exe, it backups the mbr to an image file

 

Actually, I would go ahead and install Windows on there first. If you're going to use Ubuntu, you can load the live cd and run the installer from there and it will automatically create a linux partition and a swap partition for you, as well as format them. Just my $.02.

 

Ubuntu is a great distro, I never had problems with it. Gparted is very good, even if there is already Windows installed - but as with every partition manager, there can occur problems.
Creating the partitions before installing windows is a very reliable way to avoid this. Windows should be installed first, because it kills the MBR. Ubuntu does that too, but it inserts automatically an entry for Windows in its boot manager, so it's no problem.

Virtual machines will slow down the guest OS, but I use them to run Windows on Linux ;-)

Regards
Aaron

 

Another issue would be data exchange since Ubuntu can only realiably read NTFS partitions.
I would, prior to installing XP or Linux, make a primary partition for Windows (NTFS), an extended FAT32 partition for data exchange between Linux and Windows, and another extended partition for Linux.
Then install XP in the primary partition. After that, install Ubuntu in the extended partition for Linux (which will be divided up further into logical partitions swap, root, home, etc.). And as aspettl says, Ubuntu will overwrite the MBR and install the boot loader Grub so you can conveniently switch between operating systems.

jasper

 

I used the following to install dual boot Windows XP and Ubuntu.

http://www.crhc.uiuc.edu/~mjmille2/howtos/dual-boot-linux-and-windows/

The only slight different was that I couldn't partition my hard drive first. My Windows XP CD always wanted to format the whole hard drive when I tried to install it. So I installed Windows XP then used partition magic to resize the Windows partition and create other partitions.

 

Here's another Ubuntu specific dual boot guide;

http://users.bigpond.net.au/hermanzone/index.htm

Also don't forget to visit the ubuntu forums if you have specific questions, (that is, if you decide to go with Ubuntu). In my experience, the way to do dual boot XP and Linux follows the same basic steps in every guide.

1) Install Windows XP FIRST. When the install process asks to use the entire disk, choose no, and then create a partition to install XP on. Choose the right size for your needs. The install process will then ask you if you want to format it with NTFS (yes), and then it will proceed to install XP. (You don't need to purchase anything extra like Partition Magic..)

2) Once XP is setup to your liking, boot your computer with an install CD from your favorite Linux, and it should walk you through the process to use the remainder of your disk for the Linux partitions you will need. Once the install is completed you will usually go through the process of installing a boot manager, like Grub, which will allow you from then on to boot either Windows XP or Linux.

You will read lots on different partition strategies in these and other forums for an advanced discussion. On my last install I actually created 2 NTFS partitions instead of just one. One was for XP and Apps, and one for my XP My Documents folder (all of my personal data). I did this so I could access my XP personal data from a VMWare XP Session running on top of Linux later. Also I used to always leave space at the end of my drive for a FAT32 partition to read and write to from both XP and Linux, and then I stopped doing it. I have an MP3 player which is seen as a FAT32 USB drive from both sides, and that's good enough for the small amount of data I need to move from side to side. Anyway there's no one perfect way to organize your partitions, just what works best for your needs..

Lastly. However you decide to go, find some good howtos on the web, and then print them out in hardcopy. Then go and install your OSes. There's nothing more frustrating then to be halfway through your Linux install and you forgot the next step, and need to boot back into Windows just to access the Internet.. Good luck..

 

Agree with what jas says above. I have done this in the past with an HP laptop and it worked okay. Well, actually, the Linux part was rock solid, but Windows XP Home Edition was flakey and needed reinstalling 1-2 times a year. But I don't think that had anything to do with the dual boot configuration.

Another option that I'm considering for my next laptop, which I'll be buying some time in the next month, is installing Linux as my primary OS, and running Windows XP inside Parallels. I have been using that setup on my desktop at work for the last month, and it's pretty good. With a fast Core Duo and plenty of memory, it should run quite well on a laptop I would think.

Of course, Parallels involves a performance hit (though I hardly notice at work), which would preclude using any demanding games or graphics programs. You could of course install Windows XP as your primary OS, and then run Linux within Parallels, though I haven't done that myself.

 

Just a little note, if you use the openSuse installer it will automatically mount your windows partition to linux for you, so no need to create fat32 in that case

 

I have a Compal HEL80 dual-booting Windows XP Home and Ubuntu Linux 6.06 LTS. Just follow jas's guide.

The need for FAT32 is in the case where you want to share data between Windows and Linux. Windows can't read or write to Linux partitions, and Linux does not yet fully support writing to Windows partitions with NTFS. FAT32 is fully supported by Linux and, of course, Windows. I keep a 7 GB partition that's FAT32 so I can easily swap files between Windows and Linux on my notebooks, should the need arise.

 

This is the nice thing about using Parallels to run one OS as a process inside the other - the file sharing becomes much more flexible. For example, I have set my Linux OS to share a number of it's directories with Samba. Then I can easily access these directories with read write permissions from Windows XP running in Parallels. The file systems in use cease to be an issue, because Samba takes care of that.

I use this a lot for scripting, which I prefer to do using Python in Linux. But I can have Python scripts analyse a bunch of data in Linux, and then dump the results into text files which I can read straight into a statistical analysis package running in Windows. No need for file transfers or even a reboot.

As I said, I haven't tried this yet on a notebook, but it works great on my desktop.

 

Another option is the Ext2 IFS for Windows, which gives R/W access to ext2/3 partitions from within Windows.

If you need to go the other way, then the linux NTFS project has recently released a beta of their 3G NTFS linux driver, which I believe also allows full R/W access.

 

There are some issues with using the linux NTFS driver - I hit some problems while trying to delete 10+ files. Just a word of caution, since Microsoft is hardly like to open up the specification, the support for rw under Linux will be limited. Avoid writing to ntfs from linux if you are dealing with critical data on that partition, instead create a shareable fat32 partition or just remove xp

 

There certainly has been some problems with linux and NTFS, especially writing to NTFS as you pointed out. However as TedJ referenced above, the Linux-NTFS project has recently come out with new 3g driver that they claim provides much better read/write capabilities. Hopefully this means a future version of the ntfs driver that addresses some of these past problems. You can read a bit about it at;

http://sourceforge.net/mailarchive/forum.php?thread_id=23836054&forum_id=2697

 

Hi all.

I have no experience with linux but want to learn( I'll need it sooner or later in my career, mathematical physics). I've ordered a Z35F without a OS. I will wait until I get to university to pick up a free copy of XP pro. At that time I would like to be able to boot up XP or linux, with XP being my main OS.

Will I run into any problems by installing Ubuntu first and then XP? If not, how should I go about installing the OS's?

William Sim

 

Generally speaking, you should install Windows followed by your linux distro of choice. Virtually every linux installer I've used can detect an existing Windows installation and add it to the boot-time menu, while Windows will wipe any existing bootloader and replace it with it's own.

The trick is to partition, allowing space for the linux install, but DO NOT create your linux partitions yet! Only create the partition/s you'll need for Windows. Then, once you start your linux install, create your linux partitions using the installer's partitioning tool.

Not doing this can cause compatability problems down the track, linux partitioning tools have trouble creating Windows partitions and vice versa.