A few questions before I reformat and install XP and Ubuntu

addylad

addylad

addylad

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Hi,

So I'm almost ready to try out Ubuntu and XP together (dual booting) on my 5 year old laptop. It has XP Home, 1.5GB of RAM, 100GB hard drive and a 32bit Mobile AMD Athlon 2400+ CPU (no idea how good that is). I wanted to dual boot XP and Linux together, but I haven't got a clue about Ubuntu's requirements.

A bit of research told me that Linux is compatible with most hardware, and many people on here seem to have had success with their systems.

I had a few questions in mind:
1. I was going to go for a fresh install of both operating systems; would I install XP first and then Linux? I heard Linux recognises XP.
2. How much of the 100GB should I allocate to each operating system? Also, should I partition (at the moment it is 40, 40, 20) or not?
3. Would you recommend separate partitions for both Windows and Linux files?

Feel free to ask any questions, I have all day. :)

Thanks.
 
1. Yes, XP should be installed first, Ubuntu should automatically add an entry for Windows. Though if you did it the other way round it's not hard to fix.

2. Depends on what you're going to have on the partitions, personally I don't think either my Windows or Linux partitions have ever gone over 10gb (games and media are normally what take up the space for me and I usually put them on other partitions). You'll need a swap partition for linux as well (2-3gb, same purpose as the swap file in Windows). I'd also recommend a separate home partition (for Linux), this stores configuration files and general documents so again what size it should be depends on what you plan on storing on it.

3. Not quite sure what you mean here.
 
1. Yes, install XP first, then Ubuntu will allow you to create a dual boot and give you the option on how much space to allocate.
2. 20-30GB should be plenty for Ubuntu, depending on what you want to store on it, of course.
3. You can access the Windows NTFS partition from within Ubuntu, but not the other way around. If you create an extra partition (FAT32 or NTFS) you can use that as a share that is accessible from both operating systems.

Edit: Must type quicker!
 
Thanks for the replies :)

Is that swap file created automatically? And should I remove all of my partitions before installing XP?

I can't wait ;)
 
Remove all partitions, while installing XP, make one about half the size of the disk, which XP will be installed to.

When installing ubuntu tell it to use the remaining unpartitioned space as it wishes. The swap area will be automatic then.
 
BigglesPiP said:
Remove all partitions, while installing XP, make one about half the size of the disk, which XP will be installed to.

When installing ubuntu tell it to use the remaining unpartitioned space as it wishes. The swap area will be automatic then.
Click to expand...

Thanks very much. What format would you recommended for the partitions (I would have thought NTFS for Windows)? Also would removing the partitions be done during the Windows install, or before?

Sorry for these questions but I'd like it to go as smoothly as possible.
 
Yes, use NTFS for Windows and EXT3 for Ubuntu (it'll be the default), except the swap partition which will use its own swap file system. Though it sounds like the Ubuntu installer will handle the partitions and file systems for you anyway so you probably don't even need to think about that. I'd recommend NTFS for any partitions you want to use in Windows and Ubuntu.

You can remove the existing partitions before or during the Windows install, it doesn't matter.
 
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