Thinkpads Forum

Hi
I have decided I can't abandon Windows 100% just yet as I am still learning Linux so I will try to dual boot since I have found some very nice tutorials on how to do this.

My question is how should I set up my partitions? I have a 250gb hard drive in my T42P. I was thinking of making like 210gb for XP and the remaining 40gb for Ubuntu. Do you think this will work out okay or does it have to be like a 50/50 split?

40gig should be plenty: I run debian on drives from 30gig on down to 4

Sweet. As soon as this thing is done resizing my hard drives I can reinstall Ubuntu. Been 2 hours...lol

Hi,

Muffd; You said you are going to install Ubuntu as dual boot. Could you point me in the right direction for instructions on this?

I want to do this myself!

Thanks in advance.

The Ubuntu installer has a partition resizer built in. When you boot to the Ubuntu CD there will be an icon on the desktop to install Ubuntu to the hard drive. If you pick the automatic install it will partition the hard drive all by itself and install Ubuntu. The only thing is you have no control over the size of the partitions although it usually does something similar to muffd's arrangement. You can also pick manual partitioning to specify the size of the Windows and Ubuntu partitions but it is more complicated than the automatic install.
Before doing any of this defrag your Windows install and backup everything in case of a disaster. The partitioning goes faster on a freshly defragged drive and any time you play with the partitions there is a chance of data loss.

vadarfone wrote:Hi,

Muffd; You said you are going to install Ubuntu as dual boot. Could you point me in the right direction for instructions on this?

I want to do this myself!

Thanks in advance.

Hi
Here is the link that I am using:
http://apcmag.com/how_to_dual_boot_wind ... _first.htm

Right now, I had the drive set up for like 200gb-xp and the remaining 50gb for Ubuntu.

My problem is I don't know what type of partition to manually set it up for. I was hoping it would have done it by itself. Gotta do some research now.

muffd wrote: My problem is I don't know what type of partition to manually set it up for. I was hoping it would have done it by itself. Gotta do some research now.

If you are speaking of filesystem type, just go with ext3. It's a good mix of reliability and speed. If you want more speed, go with something like jfs, but you loose a little reliability, the option to resize filesystems, and all of the great recovery tools avail for ext3.

Stick with ext3.

Hi again everyone,
This is what I had to do today.
Reformat the whole drive and make one large partition.
Restore ghost image from initial install.
Now I am going to install Ubuntu again and just repartition the drive to like 220-30 (for ubuntu).

whew! what a day!

one thing I started doing some years ago and have had more than one occasion to be glad of: always make a separate partition for /home. this way you can blow away and reinstall your linux os (or a different unix of any sort) and not worry about data.

my thinkpads and desktops are all:
/dev/sda1 - xp (ntfs-3g works amazingly well)
/dev/sda2 - swap (too bad nt can't share linux swap!)
/dev/sda3 - / (10gb is usually enough)
/dev/sda4 - /home

and when you need it there is always gparted/pmagic livecd.

I just experienced that numlock key issue on my Thinkpad. Thank goodness for google. I couldn't figure out for a minute here why this thing wouldn't go away and let me type normally.

Hi,

just to add to the conversation...

I installed Ubuntu 8.04 on a 5400 40gb external 2.5 HD (the old one from my T42), in a USB Caddy.

It is now up and running with Ubuntu, and whilst everything is not working as planned yet, I am making advances on a daily basis.

I still have XP on my internal 2.5 7200 Travelstar HD, and have set my bios to boot first from USB, and then from internal, so if I want to play around with linux, I just stick the drive in and fire it up.

It is more of a hobby project than anything, and I am not at a stage where I can abandon XP yet, but everyday things get easier which is cool.

If I make any major discoveries I will post them up here.

Cheers

Hi Vaderfone,
I am kinda like you. I still have it in a dualboot configuration. So far everything is working:
3d acceleration
wifi
ehternet
sound
trackpoint and even the center scroll button
i got IE6 installed with Wine so I can view stuff from work that doesn't go well with Firefox
teamviewer installed with Wine for remote desktop to windows machines.

All I gotta get going now is the VPN and I'm set:)

muffd wrote:...teamviewer installed with Wine for remote desktop to windows machines...

You shouldn't need to use WINE to do remote desktop sessions to Windows machines. Try the package tsclient.

Teamviewer is used for remote support of client machines where the client either does not know how to forward a port or cannot due to administrative restrictions.
Teamviewer does not require the person being assisted to forward any ports in their firewall, RDP does. RDP does not work in every situation, nor does Teamviewer. Use the right tool for the job at hand.