I want Vista + Kubuntu dual boot

[ayush]

I have windows vista (64-bit) installed on the main partition of a 250 GB hard disk. The other partition is 12 GB, which HP uses for recovery.

I have three questions :
1. How can I partition my hard disk?
2. How many GBs should I allocate to this patition?
3. If I install kubuntu-10.04 LTS (64-bit) on this partition, will it ask me if I want to start Windows Vista or Kubuntu, at boot up?

Please help. I'm a newbie.

[dibl]

Re: I want Vista + Kubuntu dual boot

#5 on the link in my signature has guidance and links to partitioning information. If this is your first time partitioning a hard drive, I would advise you to make a Parted Magic Live CD or USB stick, and then find a USB stick or old hard drive that you can practice on.

You are limited to 4 primary partitions. Since 2 are already monopolized, you can only have two more, and I would think you would want 3 more (meaning you'll have to use logical partitions inside an extended partition):

Kubuntu
swap
DATA (I assume you want to share data between Linux and Windows, so this will need to be NTFS format)

So, you might want to consider making a third primary partition, for DATA (go ahead and LABEL it "DATA" with the partitioning tool), and then the fourth primary partition will be of the "Extended" type, and you can put Kubuntu and its swap partition in two logical partitions in that one. They will be number "5" and "6" -- no worries. As for size, I'd recommend 15G for Kubuntu, 2G for swap, and the rest can be for your DATA partition.

[ayush]

Re: I want Vista + Kubuntu dual boot

will i able to logon to windows vista as well, after installing kubuntu?

[Snowhog]

Re: I want Vista + Kubuntu dual boot

how_to_dual_boot_windows_xp_and_linux_xp_installed _first

Once there, look for the link for the guide for Vista and Linux, Vista installed first.

[dibl]

Re: I want Vista + Kubuntu dual boot

will i able to logon to windows vista as well, after installing kubuntu?

Yes, follow the instructions in the link Snowhog gave you.

To amplify, when you install Grub (at the very end of the installation process), it has a function called "os_prober" that runs and detects other operating systems installed on your computer, and then uses that information as it builds a boot menu for you. If all goes as designed, when you reboot you will have a text boot menu, on which you can highlight the OS that you intend to boot. The default (top) item will be Kubuntu.

Based on posts on this forum and Ubuntu forums, os_prober is less than 100% successful in setting up boot menus. If for some reason it does not pick up your Windows OS, or place it correctly in your boot menu, then just post back and we can show you how to edit the Grub files to fix the issue. It's not hard, just a little non-obvious.

[verndog]

Re: I want Vista + Kubuntu dual boot

Providing you have backed up the recovery partition it can be deleted/ reused.
As far as I know HP supplies a utility to make this DVD back up.

On edit:
You want such a DVD back up as hard disks will fail.

I have a new HP and it did come with HP's recovery disk on 3 DVD's. I also copied HP's recovery disk using several different methods, just to be sure.

A side note. After keeping HP recovery partition intact but moving it a little south, the F11 key that is suppose to boot into it on boot up no longer worked. But os-prober found it, and created a title menu that did work!

Much later I removed HP's partition, because it was using one of the primary partitions, the other two were being used for Windows 7. I hacked Windows7 into using only one primary partition, so I now have 3 more available. I did create a lone NTFS data partition as dibl mention to the OP. I can easily share data between Linux and Windows with that partition.