2 Drives - One XP - One Potentially Linux - Please Help

bluebaker91 · 10-22-2008, 04:50 AM

Hi

C - will still remain XP.
D - will possibly be Linux.

How do I make them live in harmony? Would like to boot from Linux but still be able to access my stuff from XP.

Can you walk me through this - including the links to download - and the process of just doing it?

PS - D is already partitioned.

Thanks.

bb

glade88 · 10-22-2008, 05:15 AM

Which linux distro do you want to go for?
If you go for ubuntu, download it from here: www.ubuntu.com/getubuntu/download
Boot into the Ubuntu LiveCD and select "Install Ubuntu" from the menu.
Proceed with the installation. At the partition manager, delete your D drive and make 2 new ones: Select first one as mountpoint / (mountpoint option will be available when you click "New Partition") and the second one as mountpoint "swap area".
Proceed with the installation. Windows will be auto detected and added to the boot menu.
More on installation: www.psychocats.net/ubuntu/installing

**Bartender** · 10-22-2008, 09:12 AM

blue -
Partitioning and disk management causes as much trouble for newbs as any single aspect when getting started in the Linux world.

It's not horribly difficult, it's just that most of us don't have a lot of experience in this field. And it's scary to think that you could wipe out your Windows install!

psychocats website is good. aysiu has put a lot of work into it.

I'd suggest spending a weekend practicing. Remove the Windows HDD. If your PC uses the PATA interface make sure the jumper on the back of the Linux HDD is set to "master" and pop it in where the Windows drive was. If your PC is SATA you don't have to worry about jumpers.

With the Windows HDD disconnected (either physically removed or just disconnected from the cables) and the Linux HDD hooked in, practice installing Linux to the Linux drive a few times. Take notes! Notice how the drive is identified (sda1). That'll change when you put the Windows HDD back in. The Linux drive will be identified as sda2. First few times just let Ubuntu install automatically. When you feel like you've got the hang of it, you might want to try manually partitioning & mounting, but that's more than I want to explain right now. Lots of old threads on these subjects. Mounting devices is a foreign topic to us Windows users, but not impossible to understand.

Once you feel comfortable with installing (five or six times oughta get you close) then you could contemplate dual-booting. With two separate drives, as you propose, there are two main paths that I know of.

One, install to the second drive and let the GRUB bootloader tweak the Windows MBR so that you get the GRUB screen at startup letting you choose which OS to boot. Here's what happens when you do it this way: a small bit of the Linux installation actually installs to the Windows HDD, changing the Windows Master Boot Record. This is pretty reliable, but not 100%.

Two, install ALL of Linux to the second HDD. No part of GRUB bootloader goes to the Windows HDD. This works well if your PC's BIOS allows you to tap on a key during boot-up that stops the boot process and asks which device you want to boot from. If your PC does NOT have that option during boot-up this second method won't work.

The trick to successful installation using the second method is finding the spot where you tell GRUB to install to hd1 instead of hd0. Last time I checked it was a very small window on the very last screen of the install process, just before you hit "Go" and the installer starts to do its thing. Another good reason to practice a few times.

If you have a Windows CD, you could also install Windows to the Linux HDD, then practice dual-booting Linux to that drive. Dual-booting to a single drive is not quite the same as two separate drives, but the practice would still be invaluable. Just don't go online with that drive and let Windows try to authenticate! Then wipe the drive clean once you're done practicing, so there are no issues with Microsoft about "illegal" installations.

EDIT: You mention D is already partitioned. Did you format it to the ext3 file system? If it's formatted to ntfs Linux will have to wipe out the structure and start over. What tool did you use to partition? I like the GParted LiveCD. It's free and has worked well for me. Only time GParted goofed up was when it tried to shrink an existing Vista partition. Vista wouldn't boot and I had to start over. When working with empty drives it's a great tool.

**wmorri** · 10-22-2008, 11:36 AM

Bartender,

That was a lot of great information, especially about removing the window hdd and practicing.

Blue, here are some directions on how to get and run GParted:

Please follow these instructions line for line. This will allow you to partition your hdd. You will need two things, an ISO file from

Gparted, and a program that will allow you to burn a LiveCD. I would recommend CDburnerXP, or Finalburner. Unless you have a cd burner that will burn ISO files. A regular cd burning program won't work. It must have an ISO burning function.

Go to GParted, then download an ISO file for the latest version.
Download a copy of CDburnerXP or Finalburner or an ISO burner of your choice.
Burn a LiveCd

Please let us know if any of this is confusing, it may all be very strange to you at first.

Cheers!

**Bartender** · 10-22-2008, 08:22 PM

wmorri -
Thanks for the nice comment. I appreciate that, especially coming from someone like you, who has spent a lot of time helping others.

I haven't done an Ubuntu install for several months now. Can you confirm for me that the spot where you tell GRUB where to install is still in that little window on the last page of the installation procedure?

Way I remember it, there was a little window (that was not very obvious) on that last page before turning the installer loose that let you tell GRUB where to install.

I'm guessing that maybe the folks who put together the Ubuntu installer set it up that way intentionally so people would be less likely to screw up the bootloader!

**wmorri** · 10-23-2008, 07:24 AM

Hi,

I believe that it is in step 5 of the installation. If you take a look at these two post they might help you out and anyone else for the matter: Linux Installation guide(written), Ubuntu Graphical Install. See if this is what you are talking about.

Cheers!

**Bartender** · 10-23-2008, 05:28 PM

I'm on dial-up so I don't get around much! Didn't know there was a "graphical install" guide. That's handy. The place where I was expecting to see the GRUB options was the "Confirmation" page. Unfortunately, he was installing to the entire HDD so it appears the GRUB options window did not appear in those screnshots. I gave away my old Linux test-bed PC, otherwise I'd verify this right now.

Sheesh. You put a lot of work into that text-based guide!

**wmorri** · 10-23-2008, 09:00 PM

Hi,

Yeah, I got sick of people asking the same question over and over again. It is kinda of how I feel here, everyone asking about installing Ubuntu, all the time. I haven't had the time to deal with coping and pasting each post from one forum to another. But that might be something that i get done tonight, then I will just have to get an admin to sticky it for me and I will be set.

It is a good guide for any of the more popular linux distros, I might update it a little bit to add like Puppy and maybe something else too. I don't know.

Cheers!

**Bartender** · 10-24-2008, 08:31 AM

I wish I had cable and a digital camcorder. I'd really like to put together some YouTube videos.
The one I'd most like to do would be a video showing how to use GParted to set up an extended partition, build logical partitions inside (for /, swap, and /home) then manually install Ubuntu to those partitions.
It's not rocket science, but there are hundreds of individual steps and there's no way you could describe it textually.

EDIT: I've found that no matter how many stickies you make, people will still ask questions. I think I understand part of that. I asked lots of basic questions a few years back. I coulda googled around, but I think I needed the morale booster of a real person actually responding to me and saying I could do it.

In the end, I still had to "just do it" and learn by screwing up. That's why I always suggest that people practice on a spare PC or a spare HDD.

**wmorri** · 10-24-2008, 08:42 AM

Bartender,

I definitely understand where you are coming from. I spent many a day installing and then reformatting. It is like a right of passage almost, for people that want to install an OS by themselves.

As a note to your comment about people still asking basic questions, that doesn't bother me very much. I just with I had a place that I could direct them, for some additional help, and a graphical install guide on the web.

Also, I have started creating "canned speeches" which is something that I learned from my short stay in the HJT academy. For instance my post about GParted is a canned speech that I just load in every time that way I don't have to rewrite it all the time.

Cheers!

10-22-2008, 04:50 AM	#1 (permalink)
bluebaker91 Registered User Join Date: Oct 2008 Posts: 1 OS: xp	2 Drives - One XP - One Potentially Linux - Please Help Hi C - will still remain XP. D - will possibly be Linux. How do I make them live in harmony? Would like to boot from Linux but still be able to access my stuff from XP. Can you walk me through this - including the links to download - and the process of just doing it? PS - D is already partitioned. Thanks. bb

10-22-2008, 05:15 AM	#2 (permalink)
glade88 Registered User Join Date: Oct 2008 Location: /dev/null Posts: 11 OS: Kubuntu 8.10	Re: 2 Drives - One XP - One Potentially Linux - Please Help Which linux distro do you want to go for? If you go for ubuntu, download it from here: www.ubuntu.com/getubuntu/download Boot into the Ubuntu LiveCD and select "Install Ubuntu" from the menu. Proceed with the installation. At the partition manager, delete your D drive and make 2 new ones: Select first one as mountpoint / (mountpoint option will be available when you click "New Partition") and the second one as mountpoint "swap area". Proceed with the installation. Windows will be auto detected and added to the boot menu. More on installation: www.psychocats.net/ubuntu/installing

10-22-2008, 09:12 AM	#3 (permalink)
Bartender Mentally divergent Join Date: Jun 2005 Location: Chehalis, WA, USA Posts: 1,285 OS: W2K, Ubuntu 8.04	Re: 2 Drives - One XP - One Potentially Linux - Please Help blue - Partitioning and disk management causes as much trouble for newbs as any single aspect when getting started in the Linux world. It's not horribly difficult, it's just that most of us don't have a lot of experience in this field. And it's scary to think that you could wipe out your Windows install! psychocats website is good. aysiu has put a lot of work into it. I'd suggest spending a weekend practicing. Remove the Windows HDD. If your PC uses the PATA interface make sure the jumper on the back of the Linux HDD is set to "master" and pop it in where the Windows drive was. If your PC is SATA you don't have to worry about jumpers. With the Windows HDD disconnected (either physically removed or just disconnected from the cables) and the Linux HDD hooked in, practice installing Linux to the Linux drive a few times. Take notes! Notice how the drive is identified (sda1). That'll change when you put the Windows HDD back in. The Linux drive will be identified as sda2. First few times just let Ubuntu install automatically. When you feel like you've got the hang of it, you might want to try manually partitioning & mounting, but that's more than I want to explain right now. Lots of old threads on these subjects. Mounting devices is a foreign topic to us Windows users, but not impossible to understand. Once you feel comfortable with installing (five or six times oughta get you close) then you could contemplate dual-booting. With two separate drives, as you propose, there are two main paths that I know of. One, install to the second drive and let the GRUB bootloader tweak the Windows MBR so that you get the GRUB screen at startup letting you choose which OS to boot. Here's what happens when you do it this way: a small bit of the Linux installation actually installs to the Windows HDD, changing the Windows Master Boot Record. This is pretty reliable, but not 100%. Two, install ALL of Linux to the second HDD. No part of GRUB bootloader goes to the Windows HDD. This works well if your PC's BIOS allows you to tap on a key during boot-up that stops the boot process and asks which device you want to boot from. If your PC does NOT have that option during boot-up this second method won't work. The trick to successful installation using the second method is finding the spot where you tell GRUB to install to hd1 instead of hd0. Last time I checked it was a very small window on the very last screen of the install process, just before you hit "Go" and the installer starts to do its thing. Another good reason to practice a few times. If you have a Windows CD, you could also install Windows to the Linux HDD, then practice dual-booting Linux to that drive. Dual-booting to a single drive is not quite the same as two separate drives, but the practice would still be invaluable. Just don't go online with that drive and let Windows try to authenticate! Then wipe the drive clean once you're done practicing, so there are no issues with Microsoft about "illegal" installations. EDIT: You mention D is already partitioned. Did you format it to the ext3 file system? If it's formatted to ntfs Linux will have to wipe out the structure and start over. What tool did you use to partition? I like the GParted LiveCD. It's free and has worked well for me. Only time GParted goofed up was when it tried to shrink an existing Vista partition. Vista wouldn't boot and I had to start over. When working with empty drives it's a great tool. Last edited by Bartender; 10-22-2008 at 09:15 AM.

10-22-2008, 11:36 AM	#4 (permalink)
wmorri Moderator/Fedora Amb. Join Date: May 2008 Location: /pm/etc Posts: 2,814 OS: Window 7/Fedora 10 My System	Re: 2 Drives - One XP - One Potentially Linux - Please Help Bartender, That was a lot of great information, especially about removing the window hdd and practicing. Blue, here are some directions on how to get and run GParted: Please follow these instructions line for line. This will allow you to partition your hdd. You will need two things, an ISO file from Gparted, and a program that will allow you to burn a LiveCD. I would recommend CDburnerXP, or Finalburner. Unless you have a cd burner that will burn ISO files. A regular cd burning program won't work. It must have an ISO burning function. Go to GParted, then download an ISO file for the latest version. Download a copy of CDburnerXP or Finalburner or an ISO burner of your choice. Burn a LiveCd Please let us know if any of this is confusing, it may all be very strange to you at first. Cheers! __________________ Linux Forever! Last edited by wmorri; 10-22-2008 at 11:41 AM. Reason: fixing code

10-22-2008, 08:22 PM	#5 (permalink)
Bartender Mentally divergent Join Date: Jun 2005 Location: Chehalis, WA, USA Posts: 1,285 OS: W2K, Ubuntu 8.04	Re: 2 Drives - One XP - One Potentially Linux - Please Help wmorri - Thanks for the nice comment. I appreciate that, especially coming from someone like you, who has spent a lot of time helping others. I haven't done an Ubuntu install for several months now. Can you confirm for me that the spot where you tell GRUB where to install is still in that little window on the last page of the installation procedure? Way I remember it, there was a little window (that was not very obvious) on that last page before turning the installer loose that let you tell GRUB where to install. I'm guessing that maybe the folks who put together the Ubuntu installer set it up that way intentionally so people would be less likely to screw up the bootloader!

10-23-2008, 07:24 AM	#6 (permalink)
wmorri Moderator/Fedora Amb. Join Date: May 2008 Location: /pm/etc Posts: 2,814 OS: Window 7/Fedora 10 My System	Re: 2 Drives - One XP - One Potentially Linux - Please Help Hi, I believe that it is in step 5 of the installation. If you take a look at these two post they might help you out and anyone else for the matter: Linux Installation guide(written), Ubuntu Graphical Install. See if this is what you are talking about. Cheers! __________________ Linux Forever!

10-23-2008, 05:28 PM	#7 (permalink)
Bartender Mentally divergent Join Date: Jun 2005 Location: Chehalis, WA, USA Posts: 1,285 OS: W2K, Ubuntu 8.04	Re: 2 Drives - One XP - One Potentially Linux - Please Help I'm on dial-up so I don't get around much! Didn't know there was a "graphical install" guide. That's handy. The place where I was expecting to see the GRUB options was the "Confirmation" page. Unfortunately, he was installing to the entire HDD so it appears the GRUB options window did not appear in those screnshots. I gave away my old Linux test-bed PC, otherwise I'd verify this right now. Sheesh. You put a lot of work into that text-based guide!

10-23-2008, 09:00 PM	#8 (permalink)
wmorri Moderator/Fedora Amb. Join Date: May 2008 Location: /pm/etc Posts: 2,814 OS: Window 7/Fedora 10 My System	Re: 2 Drives - One XP - One Potentially Linux - Please Help Hi, Yeah, I got sick of people asking the same question over and over again. It is kinda of how I feel here, everyone asking about installing Ubuntu, all the time. I haven't had the time to deal with coping and pasting each post from one forum to another. But that might be something that i get done tonight, then I will just have to get an admin to sticky it for me and I will be set. It is a good guide for any of the more popular linux distros, I might update it a little bit to add like Puppy and maybe something else too. I don't know. Cheers! __________________ Linux Forever!

10-24-2008, 08:31 AM	#9 (permalink)
Bartender Mentally divergent Join Date: Jun 2005 Location: Chehalis, WA, USA Posts: 1,285 OS: W2K, Ubuntu 8.04	Re: 2 Drives - One XP - One Potentially Linux - Please Help I wish I had cable and a digital camcorder. I'd really like to put together some YouTube videos. The one I'd most like to do would be a video showing how to use GParted to set up an extended partition, build logical partitions inside (for /, swap, and /home) then manually install Ubuntu to those partitions. It's not rocket science, but there are hundreds of individual steps and there's no way you could describe it textually. EDIT: I've found that no matter how many stickies you make, people will still ask questions. I think I understand part of that. I asked lots of basic questions a few years back. I coulda googled around, but I think I needed the morale booster of a real person actually responding to me and saying I could do it. In the end, I still had to "just do it" and learn by screwing up. That's why I always suggest that people practice on a spare PC or a spare HDD. Last edited by Bartender; 10-24-2008 at 08:35 AM.

10-24-2008, 08:42 AM	#10 (permalink)
wmorri Moderator/Fedora Amb. Join Date: May 2008 Location: /pm/etc Posts: 2,814 OS: Window 7/Fedora 10 My System	Re: 2 Drives - One XP - One Potentially Linux - Please Help Bartender, I definitely understand where you are coming from. I spent many a day installing and then reformatting. It is like a right of passage almost, for people that want to install an OS by themselves. As a note to your comment about people still asking basic questions, that doesn't bother me very much. I just with I had a place that I could direct them, for some additional help, and a graphical install guide on the web. Also, I have started creating "canned speeches" which is something that I learned from my short stay in the HJT academy. For instance my post about GParted is a canned speech that I just load in every time that way I don't have to rewrite it all the time. Cheers! __________________ Linux Forever!