Major overhaul...need advice.

So, I think this is the best place to post this, since probably more of you fellows have had this sort of experience than the chaps in the Windows forum. And I apologize, in advance, for my ignorance.

I was messing around with trying to get my Media Direct button to boot Ubuntu. To cut a long story short...my main problem is that the partitions have to be in the 1-4 range to work, and my Ubuntu (GRUB) partition is part of an extended partition, so it's 6. Anyways, after considering a lot of things, such as how that slows down performance, and how it would be nice to have one media partition I could access from both OSes, I think I want to torch all but my Dell utility partition (leaving that at least until my warranty runs out ), and use vlite for Vista, and the works. This will improve a lot of things if done correctly. But I'm going to need some help.

This is what my current partition setup looks like:



BTW, I think the deal with the two boot flags has to do with my messing around, and I think that, as soon as I boot Windows, it will sort of *repair* it's boot flag, and I'll lose the capability to boot GRUB on the Ubuntu partition, since it wouldn't properly embed all of the boot files...anyways, that's part of my Media Direct experiments...

Oh, and the reason you see no space taken up on the Windows partition is because of a *corrupted* boot, so I can't mount it from within Ubuntu.

What I want do to is set it up like so:

Is this a good setup? Please advise.

I understand I can use Ext2 IFS for Windows to use this media partition for all my personal stuff (except installed programs, of course). Is there anything special I need to do to make it so it mounts with Windows flawlessly? Will I have to mount it every time I start up? I understand I should set the mount point as /home. What effect, if any, will that have on the way Windows accesses it?

And vlite. I understand it involves remaking the ISO prior to installation. So is it something I run from Windows, that takes the ISO from the Vista disc, and then alters it, and that I put on another disc to install from? Thanks.

Well, that's about all my questions for the moment, so...

-pixelot

Edit: Just had another thought...is there any way I could reorder the linux-swap and ext3 partitions, and/or renumber, especially since I see no 4?

 

What you could do, is put all the Linux partitions into a Logical, and Windows into a primary. This way it's more organised, I feel.

And you could create the partitions first, with gparted, of certain sizes, remember the sdaX numbers, and install Windows first. Then install Ubuntu so that grub automatically overlaps MBR and you can just directly boot Windows from grub. You can install Ubuntu first if you want, but then you'd have to go into the liveCD and restore grub to overlap the windows booter. I just find that more tedious. But it's personal preference.

Install grub into sda. No numbers, just sda.

I would recommend

if you can. Where sda2,3,4 are in a logical partition. Doing this allows your windows partition to access /home quickly, and the swap in between / and /home allows for best seek time. And since you access the Dell Util the least, putting it at the back is best. Another benefit is when you want to shuffle space around, ie, increase space in Windows decrease /home space, you can just move those two, because they're just next to one another, and you won't have to shuffle the WHOLE hard drive around.

Depending on the capacity of your drive, I'd give optimally:
7-10G to /
2Gb to swap (if you use hibernate, etc. Because 2Gb of RAM is plenty for Linux that swap can be neglected)
Maybe 10G to Windows,
and the rest to /home

If you make a mistake somewhere with the sizes and it's not critical, just remember one thing, gparted is your best friend.

Can't you copy the Dell Util/recovery onto a DVD or something?

for IFS, during install, just tick 'automount drives' or something like that. So everytime you boot into Windows, it'll recognise the drive. You can install programs into /home from Windows, though some games didn't work very well. It'll recognise the /home drive just like any other drive. I wouldn't recommend giving Windows access to your / drive though. Just as a precaution.

I've never used vLite, so I'm afraid I can't help you there.

 

Thanks for the help, zephyrus. I'm not sure how to go about putting Dell Utility on a CD, or how to make it bootable, etc. And I'd probably just go ahead and put programs in Windows.

And Windows will definitely take up more than 10GB, hog that it is. Vista.

Now you say sda2, 3, and 4 in a logical partition? You mean like an extended partition such as I have in my picture above? And I thought it was all the Linux you said to put in that?

But yeah, what you said makes sense. I'll see what I can do.

As far as GRUB goes, I know the MBR is on (hd0,0). Like you said, just sda. But I don't want GRUB on that (that's what I have right now); I want GRUB on the Ubuntu partition so I can start it from the Media Direct button, and just straight Windows (no GRUB) from the power button. But that can come later. When I install, I'll just do like you said: Windows, then Ubuntu.

And thanks for the tip about making drives mountable.

 

Aye. Logical/Extended, same thing. Well, given that you have more than 4 partitions, putting all the Linux ones in the extended one seems more organised.

No problem, pixie. I would, though, recommend getting a bigger HD drive. Dual booting on 80G is quite the challenge.

Here's a nice guide for Vista installed first: Dual boot Linux Vista, Vista installed first

 

Thanks again. What I meant was don't you mean sda1, 2, and 3 in the logical partition? Yeah, bigger hard drive would be nice.

Ok, well I'm planning to crank this out today, so...

 

Pix...that all makes sense to me too, and I now how a primary partition problem with this DELL and will have to go logical I think. 80G is a challenge...if your reinstalling everything it may be a good time to up the HD

 

hehehe.. Some christmas shopping for yourself? Maybe a WD5000BEVT?

 

LOL....too late. I already repartitioned and reinstalled Windows. Ubuntu to come tomorrow, as well as my new setup with all my media on a separate partition. Screenshot of GParted later.

 

Screenies of Gparted, man, Screenies!

 

LOL....couldn't change the sda numbers like I wanted to. Even though I repositioned things to where I want, the numbers still were sort of unflexible.

 

Give it a little BSI (Brute Strength and Ignorance) yeah, I guess the system names those.

 

You could partition those in gparted first, so they'll have the names, then install it so Windows, even though installed first, gets sda4

 

Come again? I was using GParted...

What happened is that, since I didn't delete it, the Dell Util partition kept sda1, even though I moved it to the bottom of the list. Then, I made the Windows, and that got 2. Then the extended partition got 3, and Ubuntu gets 5. Or I can do the extended and then Ubuntu, and then Windows, and Windows still gets 5. At any rate, with that Dell partition there, I don't have any hope for the Ubuntu (GRUB) boot with the Media Direct button, but...now that I think about it, I like the way I have it set up. GRUB from power button, and MD does nothing until I'm in Windows, where it turns my screen off.

Thanks again. :smile:

 

Well, in that case, I guess it's best it could do. Glad you like it You're very much welcome

 

now I can reorder the swap, home etc as sda2,3,4 whatever; it's just setting the partitions up in the right order...is that what you mean? That's as primary, logical may not be so..haven't tried..

 

I'll get you GParted screenies soon. Got to get Ubuntu connected to the Internet.

 

YAY! Gimme gimme gimme!

 

Hmmmm. Sorry to be a stick-in-the-mud, but I ended up repartitioning again, since Ext for Windows just wasn't behaving satisfactorily. I kept getting file/folder corrupted and inaccessible errors, and couldn't copy files because of user-mapped partitions, and....it just wasn't good.

Ok, so I'm pretty much back to a similar setup to what I used to have. Screenshots to follow.

 

Hmm.. That's very odd. Did you try restarting? It should work after that.

Ah, well, in that case.. Pity.

 

Oh, yeah, I restarted several times. And, when booting Ubuntu, I was getting unclean shutdown errors, and disk check failed once...

It is too bad. I liked the idea of the data partition, but it just wasn't being reliable.

 

I suspect it might have something to do with your HD. How old is your computer/HD? I tried it on my T61p and it was without a hitch.

 

Well, my computer is a little over a year old, so I'd guess the same for my HD. Hmmm. Well, whatever...may also have to have some Windows Updates installed that I don't, but frankly, it's not worth the headache at the moment.

 

Aye. That's very true. No matter, then.

(I still think you need a bigger HD. hehehe)

 

Won't argue with that! :laugh:

 

I think that you need to use 'repair windows'. When I used gparted to move around my windows partitions I received an error when I tried to boot windows saying some file paths were incorrect. I found this site that helped. If you're getting the same error as me then repairing windows should restore everything to normal.

Also, here's a site to get a vista repair cd/dvd (legal).

 

Nah, this was a clean reformat/reinstall of everything.

 

Grrrr.

I just got the same error about user-mapped section when copying to my backup hard drive. That's sort of disturbing to me. What's up? Well, either my internal hard drive is going bad, or....hmm.

Well, I'll keep stuff backed up as normal and hope for the best. At least it's not doing what it did with Ext for Windows, where it would persistently not let me copy, and corrupt stuff. Possibly it's just Vista being Vista.

I'll see where I fall once all the updates are installed (including SP1 and maybe SP2?). Anyways....RIGHT. Install Ubuntu next.

Word...

 

You know, what you should do is duplicate your XP cd onto a cd-r or cd-rw, but slipstream SP3 into it. So whenever you install XP, SP3 is installed automatically. My T61p didn't come with an XP cd, so I had to make an xp cd from my C:\Windows\

Anyway....... I think you should really do a chkdsk /R on all your hard drives. Just to be safe. And, just to be very safe, defrag them as well. Use "jkdefrag". It's very good.

 

These 'out-of-sequence' partition ordering is one reason I use a separate grub partition. So, if you are interested in further advice, I'll offer mine.

I would do what someone suggested if you can and that is get another hardrive. Actually, two. 320GB is large enough for the system boot drive. I'd buy another 500 GB or 1TB drive (if you can) and put that one in an enclosure. I suppose you'd have to use USB for that one? I don't think the Vostro has an eSATA port? Anyway, that 500GB drive becomes your 'data' drive so anything important you write to there. That way, it can be any internal desktop drive even so you can choose the cheapest or whatever you want.

On the new 320 GB drive you put in the laptop (320 GB I am just suggesting) you partition the following way:

You create all your primary partitions:
sda1 NTFS - 40 GB - Vista -> Primary
sda2 NTFS (any reason you were using FAT32?) - 20 GB (XP) -> Primary
sda3 NTFS or FAT 32 -> Primary
sda4 EXTENDED -> last Primary partition you make an extended partition (rest will all be logical partitions)
sda6 ext2 8 MB - separate grub partition
sda7 linux swap 4 GB
sda8 ext3 20 GB - Ubuntu
sda9 ext3 20 GB - Another distro?
unallocated - the rest

[Note: you might make the extended be the rest of the drive and then you can divide accordingly. I partitioned similar to the above when I did it]

Even if you don't have XP, you are just making that extra primary partition because you want to partition all the primary partitions you can have so that your disk order sequencing will always be in order and neat.

The dedicated, separate grub partition is useful because it's easier keeping track of things.

Go to this page:
http://users.bigpond.net.au/hermanzone/p15.htm#How_to_make_a_separate_Grub_Partition_

I was lazy and just grabbed a liveCD (can be Ubuntu LiveCD) and copy the grub files/directories to my grub partition. Then you change the menu.lst to match your distros so you just chainload them all including the Windows Vista or XP OS.

That grub page explains it.

Trust me, doing it that way minimizes your partition problems and if you keep your data on another (in this case, it's 'external') drive, you have your Operating Systems on your notebook drive. It's easier to just re-install when there's a problem. Of course, you probably don't want to re-install Vista every time but you probably won't have to doing it this way.

 

Umm....except I have Vista. Oh, and I'll run a chkdsk /r on my drives, and I do use jkdefrag.

And I did try to use vLite, but didn't have time to dl the SP1 installer, and didn't have a DVD.

Well, I like to carry my laptop around, so I'd rather not carry an external HD for my data. And I really only need a 160 GB HD or something like that. I only have 10 GB of personal data...

But thanks for the suggestions. At the moment, though, I can't torch everything on my HD, because I want to keep the Dell Util partition intact until my warranty runs out, just in case.

 

Fair enough. 160G is very cheap now. Especially with the new year and post-new year sales

 

Yeah, I'll definitely keep my eyes open for deals.

I hope Dell doesn't void my warranty if I replace my HD, seeing as how my warranty's come in handy a couple times already. I'll have to check.

 

You know, you could clone the HD with nothing but your Dell utility in it, then copy that to your new HD. That won't be any different.

 

Very true. But I've never done that before, so I'd have to research it.

 

Go, my young padawan. Learn, you must.

 

chkdsk /r won't work because it says the NTFS volume is "write-protected".

 

Eh? Check the drive isn't read-only or something. Your computer seems to be defying every knows law in computer logic

 

So it would seem. Weird, huh? But no errors of late, so SP1 may have straightened things out. Almost makes me want to repartition again, but the hassle....I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be able to salvage my Windows partition.

 

I would, though, recommend repartitioning. For one, it doesn't take too long, since your HD is small, and secondly, it'll fix things once and for all.

But, if you're happy with what you have and it works rather well, then don't bother about it

 

The partitioning may be quick, but re-customizing Windows is a nightmare.

 

I can't help but wonder why you don't just mount the NTFS partition containing your media under Linux?

 

That's what I'm ending up doing on my A8JS...had to free up some space...

 

If you read the 2nd page, I think, he has some problems with the ext2ifs program

 

You don't need ex2ifs.

Leave all your files on Windows compatible NTFS partitions, mount them using NTFS-3g under Linux, and you're good to go.

 

Umm....I don't know if you read this whole thread, but that's what I currently do. I have my data on my NTFS Windows partition. However, I was trying to figure out how I could avoid that, since it's a bit of a bother. I'd rather have Linux and Windows both read data from a separate partition. More smooth and natural that way.

GParted screenshot:

 

In that case I guess I just don't see what the bother is.

Both operating systems can access it and no third party software is required under Windows. :x

 

I guess I just like the idea of not having to mount the partition every time I use Ubuntu (if there's a way to auto-mount, I'm all ears! ), and it would be cool to let each OS have their allotted space, and then give the rest to data.

 

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/AutomaticallyMountPartitions

I still use a separate data partition myself too, it's just a truckload easier using NTFS since Windows is so awkward.

 

Ah, muchas gracias. Hmm. Hadn't really considered an NTFS data partition. Ah, well. Meh. :GEEK:

 

NTFS is fine. You'll just have to defrag it often.