Windows or Linux?

Steve Norman · Post by **Steve Norman** » 8 Sep 2009 9:47 am

With the CD running, is there a way to switch between Ubuntu and Windows? Or can you only do this with the complete install?

no to all. You must reboot to switch os

What's a good size limit (GB) to assign to Ubuntu? The whole drive?

you dont need the whole drive. Youll only need 10gb for the system, however, if you are using ubuntu for music, picture files etc, youll need more storage for your home directory.

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=403557

I dont know crap about wubi, except its stung a few people since windows doesnt play well with others. My advice is to learn partitioning and install the traditional way. But yes it will work with 9.04.

as far as hard drives go, if you open a terminal and type:

Code: Select all

sudo gparted

then take a screenshot by hitting

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alt-printscreen

and post it here.

also post the output of lspci and lshw (type those into a terminal). this will give you more information about your computer than you ever wanted to know. It will tell you how linux sees your machine

for thunderbird:
http://www.comcast.com/Customers/FAQ/Fa ... hx?Id=2576[/quote]

Chip Fossa · Post by **Chip Fossa** » 8 Sep 2009 11:43 am

Steve,

What do you mean by 'open a terminal'?

What is 'swap' and 'home' and 'ext3'? All terms from the Ubuntu forum on "best partition size".

I never heard those terms until now. I read it, but I didn't get it.

Those codes you asked me to type in? Is this all on the Ubuntu side?

Do you mean to back up 'data' without making an image (just copy/paste)?

Just what data?

I assume I already have 'data' backed up in the Acronis C: drive backup.

Earnest Bovine · Post by **Earnest Bovine** » 8 Sep 2009 12:45 pm

Steve Norman wrote:
What's a good size limit (GB) to assign to Ubuntu? The whole drive?
you dont need the whole drive. Youll only need 10gb for the system, however, if you are using ubuntu for music, picture files etc, youll need more storage for your home directory.

Maybe you don't need to make room for all that data (such as pictures and music etc) in the Ubuntu partitions. As long as you are using both Windows and Linux on the same machine, Ubuntu can read and write to the Windows partition where you already have that stuff.

Steve Norman · Post by **Steve Norman** » 8 Sep 2009 12:49 pm

What do you mean by 'open a terminal'?

on the ubuntu desktop click on the applications menu

Applications > Accessories > Terminal

this is center where commands a re entered. you bypass the graphics and talk directly to the operating system. Its a fast powerful way to use linux.

The terminal is what separates linux from the other big OS. Even Mac is reverting to its use.

usually when a computer locks up its due to resources being overused. In linux if this happens you can open a terminal and issue commands to fix the problem.

What is 'swap' and 'home' and 'ext3'? All terms from the Ubuntu forum on "best partition size".

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ext3-

when you make a partition you have to tell the partitioner what type of file system to use. Linux uses ext2,3,or4, along with ReiserFS. Windowsz uses Fat and NTFS

all you need to know is what I typed above. So if your looking at your hard drive and you see NTFS you can say" why that there is a windows partition!"

Home is your main directory where all the magic happens. There are many directories for system files and various programs. Home is the directory where your music, photos, text files, etc live. When you open a terminal it is automatically in your home directory.

this is the breakdown here:

Hard Drive>partitions>directory(s)>files>data

alsohttp://www.linux.co.uk/docs/center/manual/intr ... layout.png

this is more than you need to know right now.

A lot of people make a partition for home so that if they have to reload linux they can save their data.

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Swap-

this is a small partition that is used in case you run out of memory. It allows the harddrive to function as ram. usually the swap partition is double the size of RAM. Since most people now have 3gigs or more of ram its not so important to have a swap partition as it used to be back in the 512 mb days.

Earnest Bovine · Post by **Earnest Bovine** » 8 Sep 2009 12:52 pm

Chip Fossa wrote: What do you mean by 'open a terminal'?

Starting a Terminal

In Gnome (Ubuntu)

The terminal can be found at Applications menu -> Accessories -> Terminal

Earnest Bovine · Post by **Earnest Bovine** » 8 Sep 2009 12:56 pm

Chip Fossa wrote: Do you mean to back up 'data' without making an image (just copy/paste)?

Just what data?

I assume I already have 'data' backed up in the Acronis C: drive backup.

This really doesn't have much to do with Linux, but my approach to backup is: imagine that my computer explodes or something and all I have left is the backup CDs that I made and stored in the closet. I try to be sure that whatever I want to put on a new computer is on those backup CDs.

Steve Norman · Post by **Steve Norman** » 8 Sep 2009 12:56 pm

Earnest Bovine wrote:
Steve Norman wrote:
What's a good size limit (GB) to assign to Ubuntu? The whole drive?
you dont need the whole drive. Youll only need 10gb for the system, however, if you are using ubuntu for music, picture files etc, youll need more storage for your home directory.
Maybe you don't need to make room for all that data (such as pictures and music etc) in the Ubuntu partitions. As long as you are using both Windows and Linux on the same machine, Ubuntu can read and write to the Windows partition where you already have that stuff.

personally I like to have a home partition separate from the os encase the world blows up.

Do you mean to back up 'data' without making an image (just copy/paste)?

Just what data?

I assume I already have 'data' backed up in the Acronis C: drive backup.

data is anything you entered into the computer. Music photos work files etc.

I dont know what Acronis is, but if it is on the hard drive itself it is not really backed up. You want it off your machine, either online, a dvd, an external hard drive etc. Backing something up onto the same hard drive doesnt protect you if the hard drive fails.

Steve Norman · Post by **Steve Norman** » 8 Sep 2009 12:59 pm

BTW this is a terminal

http://www.everyjoe.com/newlinuxuser/fi ... minal1.png

Earnest Bovine · Post by **Earnest Bovine** » 8 Sep 2009 1:16 pm

Steve Norman wrote:
Earnest Bovine wrote:
Steve Norman wrote: you dont need the whole drive. Youll only need 10gb for the system, however, if you are using ubuntu for music, picture files etc, youll need more storage for your home directory.
Maybe you don't need to make room for all that data (such as pictures and music etc) in the Ubuntu partitions. As long as you are using both Windows and Linux on the same machine, Ubuntu can read and write to the Windows partition where you already have that stuff.

personally I like to have a home partition separate from the os encase the world blows up.

Me too but I don't think a beginner like Chip needs to worry about that yet.

John Cipriano · Post by **John Cipriano** » 8 Sep 2009 1:35 pm

The terminal can be found at Applications menu -> Accessories -> Terminal. You are correct that this all happens in Ubuntu. Then you'd just type (for instance) lspci and hit enter. Then you can copy and paste the output or take a screenshot.

The Comcast mail servers should be mail.comcast.net (incoming) and smtp.comcast.net (outgoing). I'd recommend using either (1) using IMAP or (2) setting Thunderbird to not delete messages from the server. This is so you don't mave some messages on Ubuntu and some on Windows. Especially while you are using the live CD since in that case they won't get saved when you reboot.

If you are not sure if your mail is currently IMAP or POP, then it's most likely POP.

10 GB should be plenty. Ubuntu will see your Windows partitions and let you access them, if that's where you store everything then there's no need to duplicate files.

How and if you install Ubuntu is up to you, I've mentioned Wubi, it's definitely quick and easy, and it's what I recommend. On the other hand, partitioning is not hard if you use the Ubuntu installer. I think there is an option called "resize primary master + use free space" when it asks you where to install to, you just pick that. In any case, you should not have to manually partition. Such things are better learned on a "beater" machine.

As for Wubi, the version of the site is marked 9.04, and that's also the latest version of Ubuntu desktop, so I think you're good to go there. You should be able to install to any drive that has enough free space (at least 5 GB).

John Cipriano · Post by **John Cipriano** » 8 Sep 2009 1:46 pm

Acronis is great but backups to CD or DVD or an external drive are good to have as well. Make a CD with the stuff you can't afford to lose since a backup image stored on the same drive won't help you if the drive fails. Or use a thumb drive or whatever you have around.

Think of it like how people put some legal documents in a fireproof box. You can't the whole house in the box

Similarly there are files on your computer are either:

impossible to recreate (Acronis + external media)
hard to recreate (Acronis)
easy to recreate (Acronis or don't worry about it)

In a drive failure the backup images stored on the failed drive will not be of much value.

Chip Fossa · Post by **Chip Fossa** » 8 Sep 2009 5:09 pm

I backup my entire C: drive to an EXTERNAL Mybook (K:) HDD using Acronis Imaging.

I don't bother with 'incremental' and/or 'differential' next-time backups. I have enough room to put both C drives (existing and the NEW backup)on K:; then after all is said and done, delete the previous backup. Much easier for me.

I've taken out the Ubuntu CD and I'm not doing anything right now. I can see, after poking around on the CD, that you really have to install Ubuntu to realize it's full potential.

I've lost a lot of stuff in the past, and I was able to recover most of it just by re-installing it from other sources than a backup. I backed stuff up in the past and it failed. Later I found out I needed to back it up via IMAGING. Oh, that's good to know.
Now my B-I-L tells me not to rely on imaging backup completely to restore "data"; make simple copy/paste data backups, too - he says.

I don't know. Ubuntu certainly has it's own language. I hardly fully understand many Windows terms. I got to go back and read again this latest round of info.

Thanks, Steve, EB, and John.

Mitch Drumm · Post by **Mitch Drumm** » 8 Sep 2009 6:03 pm

Chip:

I think your brother in law and John Cipriano are right--when it comes to your data backup, don't rely on imaging alone. There is a lot of stuff you effectively cannot replace and you would be foolish to think imaging is foolproof. It's just another tool in the arsenal.

Backing up your operating system and applications is another matter and imaging is reasonable for that. If for some reason, you can't reinstall the image, so what? You can still reinstall Windows and your applications again. But what about your data if the only backup of it is within an image? I used to back up EVERYTHING in an image but no longer do that. I back up data only--and only on a file by file basis. If I had a hard drive failure, I would have to reinstall everything. So be it. I have never had that happen and it would take a few hours if it did.

In your case, if you have your data, operating system, and applications all on C, then it is no big deal to include your data in any image--but don't rely on that image as your only data backup.

You maybe ought to think about theft. You can get a 4 gig USB drive for $15 or so, and that should hold most of your irreplacable stuff. Just do a periodic drag and drop of the irreplacables to the USB drive and keep it out of your house or at least well hidden in the house. You could do the same thing with a DVD.

Steve Norman · Post by **Steve Norman** » 8 Sep 2009 10:01 pm

Earnest Bovine wrote:
Steve Norman wrote:
Earnest Bovine wrote: Maybe you don't need to make room for all that data (such as pictures and music etc) in the Ubuntu partitions. As long as you are using both Windows and Linux on the same machine, Ubuntu can read and write to the Windows partition where you already have that stuff.

personally I like to have a home partition separate from the os encase the world blows up.

Me too but I don't think a beginner like Chip needs to worry about that yet.

agreed, that is why I said just make more room than 10gb, I was responding to you about the home partition thing

Steve Norman · Post by **Steve Norman** » 8 Sep 2009 10:05 pm

Chip take your time, dont do anything till you are ready. You can play around with linux via the live cd and when you are ready you can do an install. lurk the linux forums and watch what goes on there.

With linux you control the OS, with Windows and mac the os controls you. With that comes a learning curve that is not natural to anyone. It takes time and patience, but is worth it in the end.

John Cipriano · Post by **John Cipriano** » 8 Sep 2009 11:22 pm

Ok, I didn't know you were imaging to an external drive. I am noticing Steve said the same thing about external drives.

It's a good setup to have...it's very often said "RAID isn't a backup", RAID being a way to (among other things) mirror one drive another instantly. I learned this the hard way when I lost both drives to a bad controller

I read somewhere that switching versions of Windows is like using a new car, but using Linux is like going to a motorcycle, I think that's a decent analogy. The interesting thing about it is that even the most knowledgeable Windows user cannot bring most of those skills to Linux; everyone starts at the bottom.

Check this out: http://www.knowliz.com/2009/08/understa ... ommon.html

Chip Fossa · Post by **Chip Fossa** » 9 Sep 2009 2:38 am

Like all you guys are alluding to, I best better prepare myself by doing more reading on Linux, forums, and whatever.

I won't be able to stop in the middle of something when installing Ubuntu to ask a question here? I'd have to quit and start over. Or worse, poke a 'choice' and discover that wasn't such a good idea.

I gotta do more reading.

Thanks again, Mitch, John, Steve, EB and all others. Points well taken.

Chip Fossa · Post by **Chip Fossa** » 9 Sep 2009 3:21 am

John,

I'm reading your last link on KNOWLIZ.

There's some good informative stuff there, such as explaining some of the LINGO.

But I also came upon 'VirtualBox' and how to use it to install Ubuntu and Win7. I didn't read the whole deal, because I was starting to get bogged down.
Do they mean you use VB to install Ubuntu TO Win7? Or VB can be used to install EITHER Ubuntu and/or Win7? (There have been some questions in Win7 topics about potential install problems going from Vista to Win7)

Mitch Drumm · Post by **Mitch Drumm** » 9 Sep 2009 10:45 am

Chip:

Virtual Box is a Sun virtualization technology. Microsoft and VMware have similar products.

http://www.virtualbox.org/

They allow you to run a second operating system without going through the "dual boot" thing. The entire new operating system is effectively just a file within your existing operating system. The second operating system would just be another menu item after you are booted into Windows.

I used Microsoft's product a few weeks ago to do an evaluation of Windows 7 64-bit to see if I wanted to install it when Windows 7 is released next month.

It works (sorta), but in your case I would say it is an unnecessary layer of complexity that you don't need at this time. I would just do the Linux evaluation via the CD method that you are using. It's about as harmless as you can get.

Steve Norman · Post by **Steve Norman** » 9 Sep 2009 10:46 am

virtual box is a fake computer. Its is a program that lives on your computer and simulates a computer. you can install any os to it, and that os is installed in the program versus directly to your hard drive.

so the difference is like this

with a direct install

computer>harddrive>ubuntu

with virtual box

computer>harddrive>windows>virtualbox>ubuntu

This is the best way to try out new operating systems, practice installing etc., but you will have to learn virtual box. thats another hurdle.

edit: Just saw Mitches post, I agree

Chip Fossa · Post by **Chip Fossa** » 9 Sep 2009 12:36 pm

That's good enough for me.

I got hold of Chris from Goldwave and he says GW is reportedly working with WINE. But he does not support GW under Linux.

Should I save, "data-wise", things like Audacity, Cubase, GW, Total Recorder, Thunderbird, Acronis, Winamp, Mailwasher - ie. almost everything in PROGRAM FILES? Plus all my created .mp3 music files/folders?

I still wish someone could help me figure out how to delete Program Files & WINDOWS (copies) from the F: drive. That's where I want to dump Ubuntu. I just want to start with a clean partition here. (I'm getting used to that word now)
I'm having trouble with administrator recognition.

I'm leaning towards a MANUAL partitoning. At least I can go step by step that way. Right?

I just got through doing another Acronis full backup and validation. So, I'm trying to figure out what to save as DATA. This is a bit confusing. A lot of programs I mentioned above have all been lost before, and I was able to re-install them. But man, that's pretty much a very very long day/night.

Steve Norman · Post by **Steve Norman** » 9 Sep 2009 1:16 pm

You dont need to dump any files as you will be simply resizing the partition. During the install you will have an option to make a new partition. Resize one to have about 40gbs free. Make a new partition on that new space. Install Ubuntu there.

As far as backup, backup anything you have paid for, anything you have worked on and anything you have saved.

this includes programs, music, text files etc.

It would be helpful if you could do the terminal commands I posted earlier. The gparted ones in particular.

1. Reboot into ubuntu
2. open applications>accessories>terminal
3. at the command prompt type without quotes: "sudo gparted"
4. take a screenshot using alt-prinstscreen
in gparted select the drop down menu in the top right corner and take a 2nd screenshot
5. if 2 harddrives are listed, click on the 2nd option and take another screenshot.
6. post those pics here before you do any install.

this will allow us to see your hard drives as they are now and will help us guide you through the partitioning portion of the install.

Also during the partitioning phase of the install it will ask you if you are sure and you will have to confirm your choices before you commit, so you have a bailout if your not sure.

also at the terminal typing without the quotes "sudo lshw" will list (ls) all your hardware (hw)

posting this will clear up exactly what is in your box so we know better what we are dealing with.

Please post those screenshots and lshw for us

(for lshw you can highlight all the text in the terminal, right click and hit copy, then just past in a forum response here)

Mitch Drumm · Post by **Mitch Drumm** » 9 Sep 2009 2:25 pm

Chip:

Yes, save all of your mp3s, Word documents, Excel documents, email, address book, bookmarks, etc--wherever you may have them stashed.

You need to save all of the applications you mentioned, but that doesn't mean simply copying C:\Program Files\Audacity for instance.

I'd sit down with a pen and paper and ask myself "what applications do I use at least occasionally"? Write em down--antivirus, antispyware, Word, Excel, T Bird, Goldwave, etc.

You have to locate the original file you at one time downloaded from the Audacity website, Total Recorder website, etc. These are typically files with an exe or zip extension. You may have installation discs for some of these if they are sold in stores and you wouldn't have to back them up. Consider all of these applications that you use regularly as more of your data that should always be backed up.

You need to find the installation key numbers that some of them probably use--Total Recorder for instance. You can't reinstall without that number if the application uses one.

This is all just good backup technique--completely apart from any Linux installation you may be considering.

Some of your applications may not run on Linux?

The easiest path for you may be to go back to the application's web site and download the newest versions to a particular folder and then backup that entire folder. That may be simpler than trying to relocate your original downloads if you aren't particularly organized. I know you are considering Windows 7, so you should get the newest versions for that installation anyway.

Regarding wiping out program files and Windows from F--the Linux install will wipe all of that out when you format that F partition during the Linux installation. That's why you have to be damn sure you are choosing F, assuming that is where Linux will go.

You will presumably be given the choice in the install of using the ENTIRE F partition for Linux, or slicing off maybe a 10 or 15 gig portion of it. You could do it either way, but Linux would certainly not need all 200 plus gigs.

I think others have mentioned in this thread that you can slice off a portion of F within Windows, before you begin the Linux install. It's called "shrinking a partition".

For that matter, you can go into Windows right now and delete the entire F partition--just understand what that means--everything on F bye bye forever. The entire drive would then be "unallocated space" in Windows lingo. You could then run the Linux installation and choose to create a small partition within that unallocated space on that empty drive. The remaining unallocated space could later be used for your Windows 7 installation. See farther down for why you might want to put Windows 7 on this drive rather than on the current C.

The last paragraph is probably what I would do--Windows has a much more user friendly and understandable means of recognizing, deleting, creating, and formatting partitions than Linux.

What were your longer range plans for that drive? Why did you buy it--it seems to get very little use?

If you are going to install Windows 7, the rule of thumb is to install your most commonly used operating system on your fastest drive--that usually means the newest drive. Or did you buy that second drive very soon after buying the PC/original drive?

So, if Windows 7 will end up on the newest drive, then you should devote only a slice of it to Linux. Most of the drive will go to Windows 7--assuming you do want to install Windows 7 at all.

Steve Norman · Post by **Steve Norman** » 9 Sep 2009 3:22 pm

The new partitioning step in the linux install phase is easier than ever Mitch, just select the partition to resize, and slide the bar graph to the new position.
Right click the new space, select "create new paritition"

drag the bar for sizing hit apply, bam partition.

We are really making partitioning out to be rocket science here, it is not. Its as easy as putting on a belt.

Linux is not hard anymore, but you need to devote an hour or so to reading the manual (RTFM in linux forum speak).

See what happens here, windows does so much for you that you cant do anything. You frankly need to know patitions to be a good linux user so you may as well take the time to learn it. If you do what I posted we can walk you through this with no data loss as long as the gods of random computer problems allow it.

Any ,Any, Any, time you mess with a hard drive, windows linux free-dos whatever you run the risk of destroying data. Its just as easy to lose your data doing a windows upgrade as it is installing ubuntu. I would argue that installing ubuntu is easier now than it is to install windows vista.

Any time you start your car it has a chance of exploding. the odds of your hard drive failing are about the same.

Chip get into gparted and look around.

Steve Norman · Post by **Steve Norman** » 9 Sep 2009 3:36 pm

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