dual booting ubuntu and windows 7

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Spartaniz

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hey,

so i bought myself a new 160gb just for my OS, and wanna dual boot the two operating systems. Theres alot of articles on how to do this- ive only done this with a diffrent versions of windows and installing linux using webui.

How do i do this? i partion my HDD 50% for Win and 50% for ubuntu- But when i boot up the installation for ubuntu it does not pick up the partioned Drive.

i thought about partioning the hard drive, THEN firstly installing Ubuntu and then windows- but that requires me to edit the grub loader. and as this is my 4th hdd in my pc, i have no idea which one I should pick:

title windows 7 beta (Loader)
root (hd0,1) <--------------------------here
savedefault
makeactive
chainloader +1

this is the guide i found on the net:

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1035999

if you have an easier solution i would be very gratefull- o btw its ubuntu ultimate and it has no webui install option.....

thanks....
 
Hi Spartaniz

Whenever doing a dual boot with win and linux you ALWAYS install windows first. This way is better as when you load linux it will preserve your win partition and will add it to grub automagically, so when you restart the machine grub will give you the choice of loading a linux kernel or loading teh windows. If you install windows after installing linux first then win destroys grub and does not preserve any settings, that is the reason you would need to edit grub again! Typical windows bull in a china shop mentality :)

So install win7 first, do your partitioning etc etc and go through the install process as usual. Then boot up with the ubuntu cd, let it run and it will ask a few basic questions along the way, once booted you are in livecd mode. Clicking the install icon on the desktop will begin the official install to HD. Let the install pick up your partitions, you will be asked if you want to preserve the win partition. Linux will sort out the rest, it will create a home partition for you aswell as aswap partition, home is mounted as '/' and swap should be sized according to ram you have in the machine, usually double the amount of ram = swap space.

Take a squiz here >> http://www.psychocats.net/ubuntu/partitioning for more info.

Good luck :)
 
oops sorry, the mount point for root would be / and if you create a home partition it would be /home.
 
Just 2 cents. However good it sounds, if you ever make a shared Document drive between the two, do not make it EXT3. The Windows driver for that is very outdated and I have heard many come to a day when Windows feels it should format your Doc Partition out of the blue.

With that HDD I would say give 40GB to Ubuntu and the rest to Win7.
 
@ Spartan, depending on which distro you're installing if you have the option to use the ext4 file system then do so. If not then ext3 will do fine. You can always sort out the file sharing later between the 2 by installing ntfs3g package to enable cross support on the file systems.
 
I’d agree with the general sentiment of installing windows before linux. Just because it doesn’t involve any extra steps.

But if you should install linux then windows, more often than not the install disc has an option to repair grub. So all it takes is loading up the install disc, choosing the repair option and bob’s your aunty.
 
ok- ive installed windows 7, and at hdd option i partitioned my 160Gb to 100Gb windows and the rest i left for ubuntu. After windows setup i restarted and booted up with ultimate edition, chose the 160gb and it installed- restarted and gave me the grub menu with a lot of different ubuntu generic stuff and recovery modes incl windows vista loader- chose that and it gave me bootmgr is missing....

so what now? :- /
 
I have 3 sata hdd's: 1x 160gb, 1x 500gb 1x 1000gb
I have 1 sata DVD-rw drive.
I have 1 IDE hdd: 60Gb

I install windows 7 to my 160gb hard drive and it takes 100mb from the ide to create a loader. don’t know why, first time I see this, or realise it’s doing it.

It installs and works.

I boot up with my ubuntu ultimate edition 2.3 x64 and choose install to the ide drive
Reboot and get a error 17 or error 22. I then change the IDE drive to be first hdd to boot and then windows starts. I then change it to the 160gb which has windows on and I get the error 17 or boot manager missing.

I followed 2 different guides on how to dual boot windows and ubuntu.

If I choose install the operating systems side by side- it wants to install to my 1000gb.

If I install ubuntu first then windows and then edit the grub, the menu.lst is empty.

I dual booted ubuntu 9.04, by installing it with webui through win7- I read a few forums suggesting that this is not possible.

PLEASE someone give me step by step on how to do this????? i give up!!!!!

o yea- if i partion the 160gb during windows installation, ubuntu doesn’t pick it up.
 
Is grub pointing to the Win7 loader partition or the Win7 install partition?

The way to run away from this 2 partition problem is to preformat a NTFS partition ahead of installing Win7. That way the loader partition is not created.
 
im not completely sure how to point it to the right loader of windows. i pointed it to the hdd and it gives me bootmgr missing.
 
which ubuntu version is it? is it running grub or grub2.

when you get to the grub menu, go to the Windows line and press e

Write down what comes up.
 
i formated now and just installed windows 7.... Its ubuntu ultimate 2.3 x64- its using grub 1.5.

i think ill just wait for 9.10 to be launched.... its so frustrating cos i love linux..... :-(
 
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