Disk Partitioning: Linux/Windows

Harlequin565

Harlequin565

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Ian
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Hi there,

I'm not familiar with disk partitioning, but as someone trying to become familiar with Linux, my PC now has the capability to dual boot Ubuntu 10.4 or Windows XP.

However, I'd like to be able to access data (mp3s, Photos, Documents etc) from both the XP partition and the Ubuntu partition. I can access MyDocuments (Windows) from Linux, but not the other way around, which means anything I work on in Linux has to be moved back to the XP partition if I need to work on it in Windows. Also, if Windows dies, I lose my data.

What I would like to do is set up three partitions on my hard drive:

-Windows XP + Windows software
-Linux Ubuntu 10.4
-Data partition for music photos and documents.

As well as ease of access, it makes life much simpler if either Windows or Linux crash, as I have the data on an undamaged partition. Theoretically, I could mount an external drive as well and sort out some sort of proper backup system.

My Google search-fu is weak of late, and I appreciate this is not a simple thing to do, so anyone who can point me to somewhere where this is tutorial'd, or give me a point to start, would get a big gold star from me :)

Oh... I don't want to pay for software to do it for me.

1. I don't have any money.
2. I want to learn how to do it myself.

Thanks in advance!

Ian.
 
Thanks Matthew. It will certainly help if I can't find out how to set up three partitions as this allows Windows to contact Linux partitioned data.

Cheers for taking the time to reply.

Ian.
 
done same here ian,!!
by far the easiest and most usefull method ive found,is anothier hard drive,
ive installed xp and linux on the smaller drive 80gig, then using xp i formated the 160 gig and named it storage,this is then loaded with either o/s i choose to use and can be written to and utilised by both systems.this allows me to have virus free and speedy browsing via linux and utilies xp for photshop and so forth,it also allows me to compare processing with gimp and raw versus photoshop,and i must say gimp is not a shabby tool lol !!
good luck with your choice anyway, J.
as an after thought if you ring around your local computer shops and ask if the have any 40 to 80 gig hard drives they will usually sell them on very cheap as everyone is after much larger drives nowadays
 
That's good news Johnny...

How did you go about doing this? Did you just "know how to do this", or did you have a tutorial/process to follow somewhere?

I don't have the knowledge to do it without help or further reading I'm afraid.

Ian.
 
if you already have both systems running on a hard drive then the way ive done it is easy peasy,just switch off and connect the new hard drive,there are cables and power plugs already installe within your case for this purpose,
at the bussiness end of your hard drive will be a jumper pin position and a sticker for setting it to slave ( or ask the shop to set it to slave for you )
plug in and boot into xp....go to my computer and you will see it has recognised it......right click on it and click on format/quick format and change it name to storage/or somthing to suit you, i put a couple of folders on it like photos,linux only and xp only,this allows you to keep o/s utilties separate,
but photos and music and saved notes/documents can be seen and write/read by any system you boot into,if i can help further let me know.
regards,J.
 
Look here: http://members.iinet.net/~herman546/index.html

With one disk, I started with a Windows XP disk (one partition), then re-partitioned it so that I now have 4 partitions:

1. XP as NTFS
2. Ubuntu as ext2
3. Ubuntu as swap space
4. Data share, formatted as FAT.

From Ubuntu I can obviously see partitions 2 and 3.

From Ubuntu, I click on Places then "xxGB Filesystem" (where xx in my case is 79GB for partition 1 [XP] and 5GB for partition 4 [Data Sharing]).
You can also automatically mount these partitions at boot by changing system scripts (not too difficult to do).

I use partition 4 most of the time, as I just save files in the root of the folder and when I boot Windows it appears as an F: drive or something like that.

I have lots of pictures stored in XP under My Documents etc etc, so in that case I access partition 1 and navigate to that folder. I wrote a simple script to mount that partition and go straight to my own 'My Documents\My Pictures' folder to save on mouse clicks.

To start with, clear out junk from Windows (eg maybe clear browser temp files etc) then run a defragment on the drive. Look at the above website, looking at the Ubuntu/Windows dual boot sections, and write down your desired partition sizes and what type of partition they will be. Then run the ubuntu install and take the "manual partitoning" mode at the appropriate time, shrinking the Windows partition and setting up your linux partitions of the correct type (eg ext2 , swap etc).

Hope that helps.
 
Thanks guys that's spot on.

Really helpful.

Ian.
 
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