That says it isn't just the Windows OS that is gone. All your data is gone as well.

There are some computer disasters in which you can reinstall Windows and find most of your data intact. But if you reinstall Windows from the above condition, you will have nothing but the reinstalled Windows (no data, no other programs, no bookmarks, etc.).

Since the drive is so big, it is possible some of that data is still there, and only the directories pointing to it are gone. But recovering anything that way takes extreme levels of expertise and effort that I'm sure are not cost justified.

I really like that my son is interested enough to want to learn another OS, and he is really good on Windows, but I sure wish he had talked to his grandfather (who uses Linux) before loading it!

I think that he would like to have both OS's on this machine, so which version do you recommend for a teenage Linux newbie and where can I point him to the proper way to install dual OS's?

Thanks so much!

Brenda

...I was afraid of that. My husband is going to be really steamed.

You don't burn the iso files the same way as you burn i.e. mp3 files. An iso file is the CD or DVD structure put in a file. I believe your burner application in Mac will have some option to burn iso images. I don't have any experience with a Mac so I can't say more but maybe someone more experienced can help.

Look at my first post. There is a link where he can download a Linux distribution that doesn't need to be installed on the hard disk. It runs completely from the CD-ROM disc and doesn't mess the windows installation. When he gets bored he can reboot the computer and remove the disc. This way he can return back to windows with no harm done.

You sure are taking it well!

I never tried Gentoo, but every Linux installer I have tried made very clear that you were about to destroy all previous contents before it would take over the whole disk that way.

I wouldn't say that someone who ignored such messages is ready to use dual OS's without a lot of supervision.

But as for version of Linux, my own opinion is all Linux newbies should be using Mepis. It has better documentation (which of course only helps if you read it) and it has simple GUI tools for several tasks that you need to deal with early when setting up a Linux system, for which some other distributions force you to dig through man pages to find the command line method.

Dual OS is simplest if you setup Windows first and tell its installer not to use the whole disk (I don't know how in Vista, but I'm pretty sure it isn't hard). Then you can install Linux in the remainder and have the Linux installer configure GRUB to preserve access to Windows (most likely the Linux installer will default to setting up GRUB to preserve access to Windows).

Thanks, I was able to get the info I needed from a Mac forum, and was able to make a sucessful recovery disk!!



Sorry that I missed that...I was so focused on the "fix" that I wasn't focusing past that. If I let him have two OS's, this may be just what he needs.


Now...onto the next question. I have the Vista recovery disk, and it wants to install, but should I set up partitions on the hard drive, or just follow the default installation? Anything else I should do differently?

You all are so amazing to help me!!

Brenda

That is only because my important files were not on that computer!!

Probably the best advice of all!

Thanks, I think I'll set up a partition just in case.

Brenda

Using just a liveCD is slow and has other problems. Since you need to install Vista from scratch anyway and you have a large disk drive, you might as well figure out how to leave part of the disk unused when you install Vista.

I've never installed Vista and I hope to keep it that way permanently. So I can't tell you where in the install process to do what in order to leave part of the disk unused.

If that is too hard, then it is possible for the liveCD used to install Linux to shrink Vista's disk usage as the first step of installing Linux. That was fairly easy in the Mepis installer (I shrank a pre existing Win2000 that had been the whole drive on one of my Mepis installs). But that shrinking step is an extra chance to get confused and trash Vista again, so it's nicer to install Vista smaller to begin with.

Your son is probably feeling guilty for losing all the data from the hard drive. Experience is the only way we learn how things work. We all have messed up our computers in some way or another. All the mistakes I made in the past has helped me in the future.

Right now, I have a good understanding of partition tables. Windows, linux and the BSD's have their ways of partitioning the drive and setting the partition tables. I've been there and done it all. Experience has helped me setup the partitions no matter which OS I used above.

Anyway, if your son plans to install linux again, backup your data in advance or get a secondary hard drive for him to practice on.

Now that sounds like a gentleman I could have fun talking with as well!

Brenda

by now u can c we are nice people, well I am.

maybe before you try to do any installing, consider some things.

how do you really want to use this opportunity?
since you have another computer, dual boot is a very wise way of going.

but I do not pretend to be an expert on vista, and you still have no true install disc, the iso image is a bootable cd for recovery work....meaning recovery of the bootloader and simple stuff.....Linux offers free operating systems....free as in free to use free to download if they are GPL...(crudely freeware)...I am using Mandriva free as we speak and have used free distributions of Linux since 2001.

Your seller of that computer may be liable to provide you with a disc?...Being female I am sure you could communicate your desire in a friendly way

However, I do not expect to seduce you into the linux world yet.

Please consider joining a good microsoft forum. I suggest this one.
http://www.msfn.org/board/forums.html

There may be a Linux Users Group in your area....
http://www.linux.org/groups/
http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...groups-lug-51/
You meet real people who will actually doing the install free of charge and the resizing.

speaking of resizing large partitions....Mandriva can do that.

There are ways of recovering data but I agree with John you are likely not to have the expertise ....hey maybe a 14 y.o. whiz kid could be found?

I hope I'm not coming in too late....LQ is crawling with info on dual-boot. In my links below, there is some help, but the real guru is Saikee. (His stuff is linked in mine, or you can just search here at LQ).

I don't agree with the notion that you would not have the expertise to attempt data recovery--my impression is the opposite.

Finally, why not give most or all of the problem to the kid? Show him how you got this far, get him to post questions where he needs more help---but basically give him the opportunity to finish what he started.

I bought a computer for my kids this last Christmas and shrinking vista did not work. Vista would not boot. I tried repair and that did not work either. I ended having to repartition my harddrive, install vista, then install Slackware.

If you want to install only vista, you will first need to reformat the disk to NTFS. If you try to install vista with the disk as it currently is, you will get an error that the disk is not readable with the entire disk formatted as ext3.

I found an easy repartitioning livecd called gparted. Download and burn the iso. Reboot the computer with the disk and you will see the partitions in a graphical format. Delete the current partitions, reformat with NTFS.

However, if you want to dual boot....

If you want 50/50, windows/linux, you can use gparted to do the following. You will need a minimum of 3 partitions. 1st half NTFS(windows), 2nd partition 1gig linux-swap, 3rd partition the rest of the disk to be ext3 (Linux).

If you are able to acquire a windows disk, pop that in first and install vista. It will be installed on the ntfs partition.

Next, as previouly said, Mepis or, Ubuntu should be a good selection for a linux newbie. Download and burn the iso. Once booted, carefully read the install instructions! Now I have never used Mepis so I am not sure about install instructions. I know in Ubuntu, you will want to install manually. If you do it automatically, it will once again overwrite the NTFS partition.

I hope this helps.

My HP came with a partition for the purpose of restoring the system. That's why it didn't come with discs. Press F10 during bootup to get to that if you haven't found a better solution yet.

You are right...he feels terrible. And most of the lost data is his. LOTS of music, etc.So, I haven't been hard on him. I think the biggest lesson he learned is PATIENCE. If he had read everything, rather than just clicking through, he would have known what would happen. But you know teenagers...they know everything, so why read the directions??!!