Windows 7 and Linux
 

Hey guys do any of you know how to install a dual boot on one computer with windows 7 and Linux? What is the procedure.
Thanks

Install Windows first then run the GNU/Linux installer -- it should detect Windows and ask if you want to keep it.

If it doesn't, don't let it install.

For Arch, see my signature ;)

There are hundreds of different Linux distributions and they are not all the same and the installation method varies to some degree. If you are using one of the major Linux distributions, there are probably any number of tutorials available online. Indicating which Linux you are using would help someone give you more details.

Make atleast 3 partitions. One for windows, one for /boot for linux(2GB would be enough), one for rest of linux.

I have a Win7 computer that dual boots Windows and Linux (right now, Mageia).

Windows 7 by default wants all four primary partitions. I can find no logical reason for it other than Microsoft wanted to use all four primary partitions because they could.

You can create extended partitions and install Linux to them. Linux doesn't care whether it's installed to a primary or to extended partitions.

download a debian7 (lxde or other); install it on CD or USB. Start Debian via CD or USB and follow the install instructions on the screen. It will be done automatically (my experience on a nc10 with Win7; now I have Debian7 as parallel boot; very good thing).

here is a good HOWTO I used https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HYw3FUnh-CQ

First you need to do some preparatory work.

Make sure that you have backed up all your valuable documents, photos, bookmarks, email etc to an external drive or similar.

Next, in the BIOS, set your computer to boot first from CD (or USB HDD).
http://lifehacker.com/5991848/how-to...rive-on-any-pc

In W7, use the Disk Management Tool to shrink a suitable amount of unallocated disk space.

Note that Size of available shrink space in MB is the maximum space available for your new Linux system.
http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/win...-in-windows-7/

Dedoimedo has done a good article on dual booting W7 and Xubuntu 14.04 here:
http://www.dedoimedo.com/computers/d...7-xubuntu.html

Here he uses Gparted for shrinking the disk space. This is fine but I would advise using W7's own Disk Management Tool.

What I did back when I was dual booting between Windows 7 and Linux Mint is that I installed Windows first. Used a single partion. And left unpartitioned hard disk space. In other words Windows didn't get the whole hard disk for itself. Put my data also on the Windows partition.

Then I put the Mint DVD in the drive and booted the computer from it and installed Mint in the unpartioned space. GRUB (the Linux bootloader) detected both Mint and Windows and offered a choice which OS to start at bootup. Mint also detected the Windows partition and mounted it by default, so I could access my data :)

I agree with this. Used the Windows 7 tool as well from an already installed Windows to make space for Linux. Worked fine :)

There are many ways to do that, but, if you install 1-linux then 2-windows, windows will almost certainly screw up your dual boot. In that case, one great resource is 'boot-repair-disk' (google for it). It will fix, well, your boot problems. So I would recommand to download the iso and to burn it to a disk, just in case you're left with an unbootable machine.

Please, don't mislead people, GParted works perfectly well to resize NTFS partitions. What is recommended is to use windows' chkdsk in case you have to fix NTFS errors, and it must be done on an unmounted NTFS partition (planned chkdsk on reboot.)

I'm not misleading people. You can use Windows 7's disk management tool as well to resize Windows partition to make room for Linux.

Oops, I was editing my post at the same time. I just wanted to say *both* work equally well. Somebody (not you actually, sorry) said he would advise 'W7's own Disk Management Tool' against GParted. With which I disagree.

I did say that Gparted was fine. I use it frequently.

Since DMT is already built into W7, it seems to be the simpler option for the original poster to use.

Both DMT and Gparted work equally well.

I was just trying to give accurate info to the OP, but, reading back my posts, I admit it was rather nitpicking. ;)