Hello,

I am totally new with linux. I have burnt the image of Fedora 6 (iso.dvd)and I want to install it as dual OS in my laptop where windows Vista is already installed. I have two drives C and D. I wanted to install fedora in drive D. But every time I run the DVD it says / root partition not found.

I don't know what to do, and don't know how to create /(root) partiotion.

Finding no other way I tried to carry out experiment installing fedora 6 on my Desktop pc and ubfortunately lost all of my data and all previous windows partitions as well.

Please give me advice how to create /(root) partition and then install frdora 6 on D drive of my laptop so that I can have dual boot system with windows vista.

Solicit your kind operation
Thank you

If you do not want to keep any existing data on your d: drive I suggest deleting this partition and let the installer do the partitioning for you. Be sure to select create partitions from unused space. Check out the documentation.

http://docs.fedoraproject.org/install-guide/fc6/en

Hi Michael,

Thank you for your reply. I highly appreciate it.

I don't have any important data in my d: drive and hence I don't mind deleting it. But could you please tell me how can I do this? I know its a stupid question but would highly appreciate if you kindly advise me in this regard as I don't have any partiotion magic software.

Eagerly awaiting your response.

Thank you once again.

You could use a gparted or knoppix live cd which does have partitioning software installed (gparted or qtparted).

The fedora installation should also have a tool for doing that, but I don't know more details about that.

Windows XP also have a partitioning tool in control panel -> administrative tools -> computer management -> disk management, which I think can delete a partition (NOT sure about that). I guess Vista will have something similar, which might work.

Yes, it does. Follow pretty much the same instructions for XP to get there. Right click My Computer, and select "Manage...". Select "Disk Management". Select the drive you want to tinker with, and then right click on the partition that you want to remove (ie: your D: drive), and select Delete (or is it remove?).

Conversely, any LiveCD/DVD should help you with fdisk / gparted (recommended), etc.

The Fedora installer should be able to delete a Windows partition (NTFS), but not re-size it.
You may find this helpful: http://www.pixellany.com/lin_start.html

Hi Tuheen,

I have Vista on a Compaq and although it is difficult, Linux can be installed.
No guarentees, but I went into the disk manager in Vista, (from what I understand you have to use the Vista manager to create the partitions or you booger up Vista). Once you delete and/or create a new partition, (I used 20 meg) you need to boot a version of Linux, I used Fedora. As Linux gets ready to install, target the empty partition, but DO NOT!!! write the install to the Master Boot Record, only to the partition record. I lost Vista and had to use a recovery disk when I discovered Windowz was no longer available from the boot.
I then used easybcd (http://neosmart.net/dl.php?id=1)to add the Linux partition to the MBR. At that point you may have to play around a bit to get the the boot to recognize the Linux partition, but when you boot, you should have access to Linux and should not have blown away Vista but once again no guarentees. You may want to Google around a bit, as PC World and some other places have good stuff on the problems with Vista.

About all I can say is I had a real good backup made, and took baby steps.

Vista, forward into the past!

I did the same. But still the problem persists.

I deleted my d: drive. Then reboot the system with fedora 6 dvd.
When I tried to install it in the free space(10 GB), it says no space for / partition.
When I tried to do it manually it says: you have to have a / partition to install.

Please advise what should I do.
Do I need to format the free space before I start . If yes, how should I as the fedora 6 dvd is not doing it.

I think for Fedora you have to have the partition formatted to FAT32 from Vista as it may not recognize NTSF (not sure). You might also try another distro, such as Ubuntu, as it will allow you to take over unused disk space and so on. Once you get linux started, the steps should be as above to keep Vista. Sorry if I can't be more help, but I did a lot of poking around to get it installed on my machine.

You can also make a partition from Vista an leave it unformatted - you can format during FC install.

I somehow managed to install fedora 6. I created root partition(6 GB) but coluldn't create any swap partition. Don,t know whay it wasn't going through. I have still 4 GB free space and my RAM is 1 GB. I know that I should have chosen at least 2 GB for swap partition. But it keeps telling me that there is not enough space for swap partition. So proceeded manually without creating swap partition and both vista and linux are booting well.

But my new problem is elsewhere. Whenever I boot linux in text mode, it is asking for localhost login: and then password. But I have created password only for grub and root and none of these are working for the above case. During the installation process somewhere I noticed that if I don't choose any name, my system will be known as localhost. I tried that one as well, but still not going through.Please suggest me what am I supposed to do now.

Thank you

linux is case sensitive so you have to use the exact password as first entered. BTW root is the linux administrator account. The password you entered for root is the one you use at the login prompt. BTW no characters will be echoed on the screen when you type in the password.

You really should create a regular user once you are able to login. If you still can not login you can boot using the install CD and enter rescue mode to change the password.

You should be fine not having a swap file with 1GB RAM and the 2x rule of thumb is IMO outdated. You can use a swap file instead of a swap partition and once we know how the system is partition we can walk you through adding one.

Sorry, I didn't really get that.
You said I need to use the exact password to login the one I created for root.
But what am I supposed to type for user name as I haven't created any user while setting up root password.
Basically the screen appears as follows:

localhost login: (If I type anything here followed by enter then the following line appears)

password:

My question is, if I type root password for the password: field at the prompt, then what am I supposed to type in at the line before that ie. for localhost login : field. Please confirm.

well I am fairly new to Linux also but, for all the Linux's that I have used it would be root <enter> then the password.

The username is root. As stated this is the linux administrator account.