All the partitions were visible in Disk Management in Windows 7. The issue is that there
are 4 primary partitions, therefore no slot for putting in any other OS.
Choices:
- blow away some Win stuff or the recovery area
- try to re-jig the setup (which was what the query was about)
- use external USB boot (what was eventually done)
JN
Message: 3
Date: Sat, 12 Dec 2009 23:57:52 -0500
From: ed stuckems <edstuckems [ at ] gmail [ dot ] com>
Subject: Re: [OCLUG-Tech] Re: Laptop partitioning
To: "Prof. John C Nash" <nashjc [ at ] uottawa [ dot ] ca>
Cc: linux [ at ] lists [ dot ] oclug [ dot ] on [ dot ] ca
Message-ID:
<cf68a7bf0912122057t498bdfc4w229cdf55b59f16df [ at ] mail [ dot ] gmail [ dot ] com>
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On Tue, Dec 1, 2009 at 1:30 PM, Prof. John C Nash <nashjc [ at ] uottawa [ dot ] ca> wrote:
<snip>
As I recall, the structure was
1 MB free unallocated
200 MB NTFS /dev/sda1
187 GB NTFS /dev/sda2
30 GB NTFS /dev/sda3 (extended)
30 GB NTFS /dev/sda5
14.5 GB NTFS /dev/sda4
(with some odd unallocated bits of about 1MB between)
<snip>
Does anyone have a good strategy for dealing with the Lenovo-style
situation, which I fear is more or less a deliberate setup to block dual
boot? This might make a very good tutorial / advice topic, and of course be
beneficial to the Linux community generally, since many folk are reluctant
to go to all-Linux right away. I find they eventually forget how to use
Windows once they have Linux, but getting them going means finding
convenient ways to set up dual boot.
Cheers, JN
This partitioning may also accommodate a recovery feature on the
laptop. I don't have experience with Lenovo but dell creates hidden
partitions to recover the original os. Dell creates a hidden
partition on the drive that is a mirrored image of the boot drive. If
you delete the partition, you remove the ability to restore the
machine to the out-of-the-box configuration.
Make sure all the partitions are visible from windows before you start
repartitioning the drive.
eds.
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