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General discussion

need help dual booting ubuntu

Mar 12, 2011 10:42PM PST

I have an e-machines running xp and wanted to dual boot it with ubuntu. Should I partition during or before installation? Anyone have any step-by-step guides for this?

-VTM

Discussion is locked

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You can partition during instaliation
Mar 12, 2011 10:57PM PST

Process is very simple if you install Windows first and then Ubuntu just chose correct option in install process, but if you want more info you can read about it here:
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/WindowsDualBoot

If you install Ubuntu first and then windows things may be more complicated because windows install overwrites some things without even asking. That link explains that in more detail too.

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If you are trying to
Mar 22, 2011 10:14AM PDT

try Linux give Mandriva Linux 2010.2 a shot. Is all GUI.

You have to ways of doing a dual boot.

Use an existing Windows install and let the Linux OS to move your data to a partition (I do not recommend that one, if some goes bad you can loose it all).

or...

Do a Windows install from scratch on a Partition first (see previous post) and let Linux wizard to do the rest. Or... Slave a 2nd Drive and load Linux on that one. Let the Bootloader (GRUB) to install in the 2nd drive. If you do not like Linux, remove the drive and be done with it.


If you want to use Linux for a test drive, I will suggest to use a Live Distro like Knoppix, Mandriva One, PCLOS and so on (go to www.distrowatch.com for other distros). Does not install in your Hard Drive and runs of the DVD/CD ROM. Great OSs to learn from.