[SOLVED] Dual boot

[ElWray]

I've already got Kubuntu 10.04 installed, and since I really can't install Adobe CS5 I'd install Win XP as well. Any chance this'll work or do I have to reinstall Kubuntu after installing windows?

Also, how do I deal with the partitions now?

[Snowhog]

Re: Dual boot

See How to dual boot Linux and Windows XP (Linux installed first) -- the step-by-step guide with screenshots

[ElWray]

Re: Dual boot

"You are not authorized to view this page"

Any chance to copy/paste it?

Thx,
ElWray

[Snowhog]

Re: Dual boot

Are you behind a firewall (at work)?

[ElWray]

Re: Dual boot

Nope. At home, right in front of the PC mentioned above

[Snowhog]

Re: Dual boot

Well, it isn't a blocked site. Check your browser. Do you have Ad-Block or such?

[askrieger]

Re: Dual boot

Actually, the referenced site may not be quite as useful to you as Snowhog hoped. It presumes that you are using *buntu 8.04 (which uses Grub1). We are now saddled with Grub2, (which is very different).

Basically, the steps are:
(1) Back up the Grub menu.

(2) Make space for XP on your hard drive, which you do by freeing up space for XP using a partition editor. They suggest gparted from the Ubuntu installation disk, but any partition editor will do. You will have to use it from a live CD, though. Just be sure not to give windoze more space than you have to.

(3) Install windoze. This is NOT trivial, because it wants to wipe out your Linux partition.

(4) Finally, you have to reinstall the GRUB bootloader to your MBR and add Vista to the boot options. Once again, the instructions on the referenced site are no longer relevant.

My advice: DON'T BOTHER, but if you must:

(a) Backup your entire Linux system to a removable storage medium.

(b) Install Windoze.

(c) Use a Windoze partitioning program to reduce the space occupied by Windoze to the bare minimum, necessary. This will be MUCH more than you think, because you will have to store all the files you want to use from both operating systems in an ntfs partition, because M$ doesn't speak Linux, while an Ubuntu package called "ntfs3g" can deal with windoze.

(d) Re-install Linux on the remaining free space. Linux installers are used to dealing with other operating systems.

(e) Restore all your "stuff" from your backup medium, remembering that it has to go into the ntfs partition.

[dibl]

Re: Dual boot

Yep, what Al said is right.

If you don't have a lot of time invested in configuring your Kubuntu system (I'm thinking you only installed it very recently), the fastest and simplest path out of the mess you are in, assuming you must have a native Windows installation, is to kiss your existing Kubuntu installation good-bye, repartition the hard drive and install Windows on it, and then install Kubuntu a second time. This will take advantage of the built in capability of *buntu to detect and set up your "other" OS, whatever it may be.

On the other hand, if you're up for one more learning and character-building experience, you could install VMware Player (a free download from VMware) on your Kubuntu system, and then install your Win XP on that, and keep Bill in a box. Here's guidance if you want to go that way: http://kubuntuforums.net/forums/inde...opic=3095339.0

AFAIK your Adobe stuff will work fine on Win XP on a VM. The only thing you won't have is direct access to your real video chip -- VMware will provide a generic SVGA video capability that will run on top of Linux. For example, I have used an old copy of PaintShop Pro on my Windows VM, with no problems.

[ElWray]

Re: Dual boot

1.

Well, it isn't a blocked site. Check your browser. Do you have Ad-Block or such?

Apparently they just don't like my country: "Unfortunately APCMag.com is not currently available in your country for legal and commercial reasons."

2. I'll definitely go for the character-building experience and keep Bill in a box.

3. Will I need to back up Grub? And even if I don't need to, how do I do that?

Thx,
ElWray

[dibl]

Re: Dual boot

2. I'll definitely go for the character-building experience and keep Bill in a box.

Great -- I like your attitude!

3. Will I need to back up Grub? And even if I don't need to, how do I do that?

No. Grub will remain unchanged. (Well, if you delete Windows from its NTFS partition, that item will come off the Grub menu in a future update.)

So, if Grub is booting Kubuntu successfully today, then that will not change. VMware Player is a package -- an application -- that you will install. Make sure you download the architecture that is right for your system. Even though the "how-to" is somewhat aged, I think it is still pretty correct in all respects, except that the latest version of VMware Player, ver. 3.1, will make its own virtual hard drive, so you can skip everything related to making a hard disk drive. Just follow the guidance to download the .bundle file, install it, and then make sure your CD ROM drive is enabled in VMware, and pop in your Windows installation CD, and away you will go. Do think about the size of your VM -- make sure you locate it on a partition with sufficient space (you could re-use your ex-Windows partition for this purpose, formatted ext4, if you want).

Good luck -- start a new thread if you encounter any problems with it.

[ElWray]

Re: Dual boot

Maybe I could use the ntfs partition I kept from Win 7...it still has around 40gb free space

Thanks,
ElWray

EDIT: I downloaded this .bundle which was supposed to pretty big...98MB but all i got is 19.6kb of plain text (with the .bundle extension)

[The Liquidator]

Re: Dual boot

You could also try installing windows within a virtualbox virtual machine.

As dibl says the principle issue is whether you require the full capability of your graphics card.

Virtualbox is available in the repos, or you can get the "nob-free" version from the virtualbox website by setting it up as a source so whenever there are updates you get them automatically.

[ElWray]

Re: Dual boot

Yeah, due to the lack of spare time I installed virtualbox and now I'm almost done installing Win xp (it's faster than ever...wow )

[The Liquidator]

Re: Dual boot

Hope it works for you. Have fun exploring.

One issue you may find, if you have got the repo version is that you may have to do a tweak or 2 to get USB support, which is available by default in the one from the oracle website.

[dibl]

Re: Dual boot

I just checked my saved copy of VMware-Player-3.1.0-261024.x86_64.bundle. It is 97.7M. You can open it with kate and see the bash shell script.

I did try VBox once, and it installed fine, but the version I had did not include USB support, which I needed. If you get good results, then VBox should be a fine way to run your Win XP VM. And YES, a 40G ext4 partition sounds like a good place for it.