Thank you for that tip.  I'm hoping to keep the windows partition though.  My idea is to reduce the windows partition to say 80GB, to free up approximately 400GB for the Ubuntu installation.  If I delete the second partition won't the windows installation be lost?

At the risk of repeating myself, you can delete the recovery partitions without intefering with Windows - but you will lose the option to factory restore from the hidden partitions. If you create recovery DVDs and keep them safe you can still use those later instead, if you choose to remove the recovery partitions from the disk now.

I think I'm going to need it!

No luck required, just a little patience and plenty of reading.

I'm wondering whether what I want to do is even possible. Perhaps I need to be looking at a tool like Ghost?

It is. As I described, I did exactly this with a GParted Live CD on a regular retail HP laptop. Exactly the same circumstances as yours. Just make sure you back up anything you've added to Windows before you start. If you haven't put anything new on the laptop, then the recovery DVDs you create first in Windows will restore the machine back to factory defaults almost no matter how badly you might mess it up.

Peter.

On Wed, Sep 07, 2011 at 02:33:29PM +0100, steve-ALUG@hst.me.uk wrote:

I'm no expert, but I believe that a HDD set up with a partition table can handle at most 4 "primary" partitions. That sounds like how your laptop has been set up.

Yes, I'm pretty sure that's how it it.

If you change one of the "Primary" partitions to an "extended" partition, then you can add extra "logical" partitions within the extended partition.

I doubt that it is possible to change a partition from Primary to Extended c/w logical partitions without destroying the data on it. That would imply having to backup, repartition, then restore. Also, I don't know how Windows would cope with the new logical partitions. In my previous experience, it can be quite fussy about drive letters etc.

Yes, and sorry, I now realise that I'm asking about Windows, which is hardly fair for a Linux mailing list!

I would also be quite dubious about the "recovery" partitions still working if you change the partition structure that they're expecting to see.

Yes, good point.

I suppose it depends what's on the 2nd partition. Is it just for data? Is Windows on partition 1? If that's the case you might get away with it. e.g.

I believe that Windows is installed on the second partition, but now I'm even unsure about that. I find it hard to understand why Windows would require four partitions.

1. Backup partition 2 (whatever drive letter it is).
2. Delete partition 2.
3. Recreate Partition 2 as an Extended Partion using all the free space.
4. Create a Logical partition to restore the windows data onto.
5. Create as many logical partitions as you need to need to install

linux. e.g. 2 / (root) and swap 6) Restore the windows data onto the relevant partition. 7) Install linux...

Good luck!

Thanks

And backup ***EVERYTHING*** before you start!!!

Good advice.

Do laptops ever have room for putting in a second hard drive? That would be a better option. I suspect they don't though...

Richard

...

I believe that Windows is installed on the second partition, but now I'm even unsure about that.  I find it hard to understand why Windows would require four partitions.

Windows doesn't require 4 partitions.  It works happily on one.  I wouldn't be surprised by 1 windows partition and 1 recovery partition, but I'm surprised by two of each.  Still, there may be a good reason.

It will work on one partition, yes, but by default, Windows 7 does install a 100MB recovery partition first, then the main OS in another. Then I suppose Compaq have added some weird OEM partitions in.. Maybe a partition for the Users folder or some such, keeping the installed programs and OS separate from the user data probably?? Could an extra partition which holds all the drivers for the machine or something bizarre like that.

Anyway, my vote/2p goes on the Wubi route or you could even run your Ubuntu install entirely inside a Virtual Machine which I am pretty sure I've seen discussed around 'ere before. Go for Wubi first, you've literally got nothing to lose. If you don't like it or it doesn't perform as well enough, uninstall it and it's gone. I've used Wubi once before ages ago and it was great at the time..

Handy thing with a Virtual Machine is you get dynamic hard drive size, the file which holds the "hard drive" can be as big as it takes up till it fills whatever partition it's in.

Cheers, Simon (p.s. I will be at pub tomorrow night.)

On 09/09/11 16:32, Adam Bower wrote:

On Wed, Sep 07, 2011 at 09:02:47PM +0100, steve-ALUG@hst.me.uk wrote:

...

to buy a blank hard disk though. Also, swapping HDDs will void any warranty!

No it won't.

Adam

I have certainly seen machines with stickers on saying opening the case voids the warranty. Googling, it seems that some laptop manufacturers say it would void the warrant, some don't. So if you have a new laptop and you want to change the hard disk, if you care about the warranty, read it before changing any components.

On 20/09/11 19:21, Wayne Stallwood wrote:

Essentially in Europe at least those stickers mean very little at all.

The responsibility is with the manufacturer to prove that any internal tampering resulted in a failure and a broken "warranty void" seal is not sufficient except in cases where the very act of opening a device can cause failure (so for example opening a Hard Drive outside of a clean-room environment)

IANAL, that said: There is a difference between a manufacturers or retailer's warranty, and your rights under law. The warranty is usually something like "If it breaks within 1 year and it's not caused by you, and [insert any conditions the manufacturer wants to insert] then we'll fix it or replace it for free, excluding postage costs".

Your rights under English law, under the sale of goods act say something like [excuse the extreme paraphrasing], a product should last a reasonable amount of time, if it doesn't then you're entitled to a refund or replacement.

Replacing the HDD should not IMHO void your rights under law, providing YOU don't damage the machine.

The warranty is different. It is usually above and beyond your statutory rights, and the manufacturer or retailer can impose whatever terms and conditions they want, (provided they're legal). Clauses saying opening the case will void the warranty may well be present.

IANAL, YMMV, RTFriendlyWarranty :-)

On 20/09/11 20:52, Adam Bower wrote:

In that case, don't buy rubbish laptops then :)

Sensible laptop manufacturers make the hard disk a user replaceable item and ship a new disk which they exchange with the old one on the doorstep. Quite how anyone would ever know you swapped the hard disk on your laptop I really don't know, even if there was a warranty sticker covering the drive bay they'd have trouble proving that it didn't mysteriously fall off one day.

Adam

Fair points. I was just trying to say, check the warranty first, just in case! :-)

On Tue, Sep 20, 2011 at 08:56:50PM +0100, mick wrote:

Tamper evident labels have been in use for many years. They don't just "fall off".

Prove that it didn't fall off... also, have you ever seen one on a laptop? I don't think I've ever seen a warranty sticker stopping removal of a hard disk on a laptop *ever* and come to think of that I'm not sure I've ever seen any warranty seal on any laptop in the past.

Adam

On Wed, Sep 07, 2011 at 02:41:28PM +0100, Brett Parker wrote:

On 07 Sep 13:16, Richard Parsons wrote:

...

Hi, I've recently bought a Compaq laptop. It currently has Windows 7 installed and I want to dual boot with Ubuntu.

Unfortunately, Compaq have already partitioned the hard disk into four partitions. The largest partition, which is 480GB is the second. If I begin the installer, and resize the second partition to create free space, then I'm told that it is "unuseable". I believe that the extra partitions are for recovery etc.

So what can I do? Is there a way of getting Ubuntu installed without disturbing the contents of the partitions already setup?

You're basically screwed - you can only have 4 primary partitions, usually when wanting to go over this you make on of those 4 an extended partition and new partitions get created in that.

I'd take a diskimage of the disk in current state, using something like clonezilla, then rejig the disk to remove any partitions that you don't need, (you'll probably want a couple of partitions for linux), and go from there.

The reason for using something like clonezilla to take an image first should be reasonably obvious, means that if you need to get back to that state you can :)

Thanks Brett for your thoughts. Having looked at Clonezilla it looks like I'll need a disk to backup to as large as the one I am cloning. So it sounds to me as if I'm going to need a 500GB external drive.

Thanks again all for your help.

Richard

On 07/09/11 14:41, Brett Parker wrote:

You're basically screwed

Or consider something like Wubi: http://www.ubuntu.com/download/ubuntu/windows-installer .. that creates a hidden filesystem within your Windows filesystem and boots from that?

Never tried it, but might be just what's needed here?