Tripple Booting Windows 7, Ubuntu & XBMC

pumaz · 2 Sep 2010 at 21:39

Bought a Acer Revo R3610 (4GB Ram, 500GB HD & Windows 7) the other day to use as a HTPC in the lounge.

I have been tinkering with Ubuntu 10.4 the last week or so on my desktop (sig) and I like it a lot, I have set my desktop up to dual boot Windows 7 and Ubuntu via Grub2 and would like to do the same with my Revo but would also like to add XBMC live to the boot list.

What i would like is to be able to turn the Revo on and have it boot into a menu where i can select either XBMC, Windows 7 or Ubuntu but if i don't select within 10 seconds it automaticly boot in to XBMC.

I know i could just bolt XBMC on to either Ubuntu or Windows 7 but i need to keep it simple for the Wife! So if no input it just boots in to XBMC.

I don't even know if this is possible, If it is could some one please explain how i can do this and what order i should patition and install the OS's

I should also point out that I am only just grasping linux and manualy editing Grub looks daunting!

SiriusB · 2 Sep 2010 at 22:09

I would probably say install the other two first, then Ubuntu. It should detect the other OSs and configure Grub accordingly.

pumaz · 2 Sep 2010 at 22:19

I'm thinking Partition HD with GParted first then install Windows 7, XBMC then Ubuntu and configer Grub to make XBMC default and boot after 10 seconds. But would Grub see XBMC Live?

Also i'm considering a SSD would this offer a big enough improvement over the built in HD to Justify the cost, and how compatible would SSD be with a Revo?

SiriusB · 2 Sep 2010 at 22:26

No idea if Grub recognizes XBMC. I guess that is something you will need to research.

As for an SSD, you WILL notice a difference. How much of a difference depends. Whether it is worth it, that's up to you. If I was triple booting I probably wouldn't use an SSD any smaller than 128GB. Not cheap.

pumaz · 2 Sep 2010 at 22:57

Yeah SSD are a tad expensive! think i'll just use the built in 500GB HD for now and decide later about SSD.