XP Vista Dual Boot

I have 149 GB of usable space on my hard drive. The goal is to have the following:

Win XP Pro - 15 GB
Win Vista Home Premium - 30 GB
Data (office, finance, etc) - 10 GB
Data (Video, music, etc) - 79 GB
Ubuntu - 15 GB

I first wiped the hard drive totally with KillDisk. I then went through the XP install process and created teh XP partition. After that I started installing Vista. It recognized the XP partition as a primary partition. I created the Vista partition and it recognized that as a primary partition. This leaves 104 GB of unalocated space. I created the 79 GB partition and it shows up as a primary partition so now I have three primary partitions, but the remaining 25 GB of space no longer show up as unallocated space so I am unable to make another 10 GB partition for data. If I delete the 79 GB partition the 104 GB unallocated shows up again. What am I doing wrong? Is Vista limited to 3 Primary partitions? Thanks.

 

Basic hard discs and Vista can handle up to 4 primary partitions, or 3 primary and 1 logical, so that probably isn't the problem. Perhaps take the easy route and combine your two data partitions?

 

do you really want to have only 15 for each os? thats going to be barely any space for programs...

 

One thing that you can do is keep the data stores on the Vista or the XP partition...

In order for the XP partition to access the Vista-owned files, simple make the user in XP identical to the Vista user with the same password, then it won't give you beef about not having access.

 

I was planning on 15 for XP and 30 for Vista. After installing just XP and nothing else I still have 11.7 gigs left on that partition. After installing Vista and nothing else I still have 18.4 gigs left on its partition.

I am only planning on using open office, anti virus, firewall, firefox, VLC media player, etc....

Hmm....I was going to use my current XP install telling you I had 6 gigs left out of 15 on my desktop after several years of use....however it appears that I have 6 gigs left out of 20. I think you're right...I might want to rethink this.

 

I'm kinda confused on this issue. By that logic I should only be able to have 8 partitions between the two hard drives on my desktop. However, I have 10. They all function fine. The desktop only has XP on it. Does XP handle things differently?

 

I would be satisfied with that except I end up frequently reinstalling operating systems. I really want my data to be on a totally different partition so that I can wipe one or more OS at any time I want and not have to reload all my data. Of course things will be adequately backed up but assuming you don't have to use those backups, it just makes things a lot faster.

 

Update:

Based on the comment blaaze made I decided it would be a good idea to start from scratch before I get all the drivers and everything installed. I also decided to do all of the partitioning with the Windows XP CD. For some reason Windows XP had no problem making the following partitions:

Win XP - 23 GB
Win Vista Home Premium - 40 GB
Data Share (Office files and such) - 10 GB
Data Share (Video and music) - 61 GB
Unpartitioned Space - 15 GB

Does anyone know why XP Pro will put all those partitions on there and Vista Home Premium will not? If it matters the XP Pro CD is an OEM CD with SP2 I bought off newegg and then used it as a source for slipstreaming SATA drivers in. The Vista Home Premium CD is just the OEM CD that came w/ my XPS 1330 (which is the laptop I'm doing this install on). Thanks

 

Before you go on, you should take some time to make sure you did not create four primary partitions. If that be the case, you won't be able to use up the last 15 GB.

My advice, if you have yest to install anything is this:
grab a Linux live CD with GParted.
wipe your hard disk clean

create three primary partitions and an extended partition with logical data partitions

-(PRI) WinXP
-(PRI) WinVista
-(PRI)anotherOS or a data partition
-(EXT) an exteneded partition with
--- data partition for the OS (you know, desktop, documents, pictures)
--- i would create a partition for programs but you could use the last primary
--- data partition for your 'small' docs (those you made and won't live without)
--- data partition for your big docs (media, music)

Then install XP
Then install Vista.

then move your XP MyDocuments folder and your Vista Users folder to the OS data partition (create a suitable structure to host them).

When you're done installing, create an image of the OS, programs and os data partition.

Live happily ever after.

 

It seems to me you have a very good idea here. I understand the limitation of four primary partitions. How many extended partitions can I have? Are the extended partitions inside of a primary partition or are they separate? I'll be doing some research here but I think I'm going to do what you said despite the fact that I've just finished installing XP for the third time....thanks for the advice, I like it.

 

One extended partition only.
Inside that, you can have as many logical partions as the the letters in the alphabet left by the other primary partitions (in Windows) and as many to reach the 15 partitions limit in Linux.

(this is per disk).

 

This is basic stuff and I should probably be chewed out for not having researched it before taking this project on. I appreciate your help and timely suggestions. You've been repped.

As a side note, I'm getting a kick out of laying waste to my hard drive with gparted. lol

 

You recommended four logical partitions within the extended partition. One for programs, one for OS data, one for small files and one for large files. This will leave one primary or extended partition available to me (EDIT: research is saying that you can only have one extended partition so I guess I only have a primary partition left). My limited understanding of linux is that it will need a swap partition. I'm wondering if I need to make a 5th logical partition in my current extended partition for a swap partition for linux. Or can linux be installed in a logical partition which would allow me to create another set of logical partitions for it(EDIT: Due to the research I mentioned above it looks like the remaining space must be a single primary partition. That must mean I need to create a 5th logical for swap space right?)? Thanks again for putting up with the newbie questions.

 

The number of PRImary partition I suggest is 3, the maximum alowed if you also want an extended partition.
One for the XP os
One for the VIsta os
One for another OS (another windows, linux, bsd, Osx, whatever)

Linux can be installed into a logical partition inside the extended partition.
In fact, my two linuxes (Ubuntu and kanotix) live happily inside my extended partitions, along with the swap file and their /home and data partitions.

If you are serious about using linux, add - in the extended partition
- a logical partition for / (this could be avoided if you choose to use the third primary partition)
- a swap partition
- a logical partition for /home
- one or more logical partitions for data

Please remember that the latest kernels see your disk as a SCSI device with a mamimum of 15 partitions allowable. You have to count in it the exteneded partition (even if it is only an empty shell for the logical partitions) and the swap partition.

I have reached the 15 partition limit in my disk.

 

I now see you had specified ubuntu as one of the os.
Here's my definitive suggestion

PRI XP
PRI Vista
PRI Ubuntu /
EXTENDED
---logical WinOS data
---logical WinOS programs
---LINUX swap
---logical linux /home
---logical linux data1
---logical linux data 2
---logical windows data small
---logical windows data big

 

Alright, once again, great info, thanks. Here is what I'm now proposing:

Win XP Pro - 23 GB Primary
Win Vsta Home Premium - 40 GB Primary
Extended partition - 86 GB

Within the Extended Partition:

Logical 1 - 10 GB OS Data
Logical 2 - 10 GB Programs
Logical 3 - 10 GB Data Small files
Logical 4 - 41 GB Data Large files
Logical 5 - 9 GB /home
Logical 6 - 4 GB data
Logical 7 - 2 GB swap

I'm starting to wish I'd gone w/ the 200 GB drive. Does this look workable?

Edit: I'm reading your new post....this will change

 

You missed the LInux primary partition for the root /
Do not put it in the extended partition -a primary partion is a valuable asset and it would be a pity not to exploit it (maybe one day you'll decide to install another OS that requires a primary partition---).

It's fine like you proposed, too. Seems flexible enough.
Besides, if you install the programs in the other partition you might want to revise your OS partition sizes.
I'd go with 15 for XP and 25, max 30 for Vista. Add the spared GB to the OSdata and Programs partitions

 

PRI XP - 23 GB
PRI Vista - 40 GB
PRI Ubuntu / - 10 GB
EXTENDED
---logical WinOS data - 10 GB
---logical WinOS programs - 10 GB
---LINUX swap - 2 GB
---logical linux /home - 10 GB
---logical linux data1 - 3 GB
---logical linux data 2 - 3 GB
---logical windows data small - 7 GB
---logical windows data big - 31 GB

I'm not at all familiar w/ installing programs on a different partition with windows. Nor am I familiar with re-routing my documents etc to other partitions but they sound like a good idea. This is why originially I had only 2 NTFS swap partitions.

As far as linux sizes go, I have no idea where to start. I imagine I will install almost nothing. I just want to learn but I think it's a good idea to have multiple linux partitions to make it so I can learn how to utilize them even if they are small. I'm guessing sizes are wrong for this though....

 

Only? LOL...

Anyways... What's the benefit of putting large data files in a separate logical partition from small data files? (Instead of just a separate folder?)

 

1. Ease of backup by partition imaging software.
2. Further protection in case the MTF of one partition get screwed up (this happened to me a few weeks ago)
3. One level of directory less (believe it or not, I had a dos like compiler that required me to move if from its containig folder under root to work).

 

When you install a program, choose the custom install and tell the installer that you want to use the folder (say) E:\Programs\appfolder
You just have to remember that.

As for folders, have a google trip: it will help you in finding the detailed strategy.
But it's not particularly difficult.

 

You have been a tremendous help. Thanks again. Now that I've got some adequate (probably not perfectly efficient but I'll learn with time) partitions I can get windows going and learn the rest of your suggestions through research like you said. Once again, thanks a million. This last hour has probably saved me weeks of self studying and I probably never would have gotten here because I need the laptop working for work this week and I wouldn't have been willing to lose a bunch of data for a new strategy a few weeks from now. Thanks a million!

 

you're very welcome.
One last piece of advice
install the os in this order:
XP
Vista (will add a boot loader entry for XP automatically)
Ubuntu - but CHOOSE to put GRUB in its own partition and NOT in the MBR. In his way you won't spoil Vista's delicate MBR.
You won't be able to access linux at first, but just download BCEdit a free program to mod the bootloader and launch it in vista. You will then add a boot entry for ubuntu that will boot grub.

 

I'll definitely plan on that. Thanks again.

 

If anyone is curious how the partitioning turned out...

149.05 GB total hard drive (that's what you'll get if you get a 160 GB drive and wipe it clean....)

PRI XP - 15 GB NTFS
PRI Vista - 30 GB NTFS
PRI Ubuntu / - 10 GB ext2
EXTENDED
---logical WinOS data - 15 GB NTFS
---logical WinOS programs - 20 GB NTFS
---logical windows data small - 7 GB NTFS
---logical windows data big - 34 GB NTFS
---logical linux data1 - 4 GB ext2
---logical linux data 2 - 2 GB ext2
---logical linux /home - 10 GB ext2
---LINUX swap - 2.06 GB