[TriLUG] Installing Windows on Ubuntu

Joseph Mack NA3T jmack at wm7d.net
Wed Aug 31 13:13:25 EDT 2011


On Wed, 31 Aug 2011, Tarus Balog wrote:

> 1) Is the Windows installer going to nuke grub,

of course. Do you think Windows acknowledges the existance 
of any other OS?

> and if so how to do I prevent it? I'd like to continue to 
> use grub as my bootloader.

it's easier to boot windows if it's in the first partition

If you have dual boot, no matter which order you install 
windows and Linux, make sure you dd copy the first 63*512 
bytes of your partition after each install (in case you want 
to go back).

I install linux first (leave sda1 for windows, swap in 
sda2, / in sda3...), setup grub, dd the first 63 sectors to 
somewhere safe.

Then install windows and get it working. Now Linux is 
inaccessble. Boot with a live CD, dd copy the first 63 
sectors to somewhere safe and copy back your linux 63 
sectors. Boot into Linux. Now windows is inaccessible. Fix 
grub to boot windows. dd copy your first 63 sectors to 
somewhere safe. You'll need this if you ever trash your 
partition table.

> 2) What virtualization solution should I use? I used KVM 
> to create some Linux VMs without problem, but in my 
> research I am not sure that is the best thing to use for 
> Windows. I see a lot of references to VirtualBox.

It's simple, it writes to a file on your linux install, so 
no separate partition is required. However it's not 
particularly convenient. I get windows in an 800*600 screen 
- I can't remember if this is required, or I just did it 
that way to have some realestate in the back that I could 
grab when I wanted Linux. One problem is that VirtualBox 
kills my automounter, so that I can't unmount flashkeys even 
as root. They are instantly remounted. After I'm done with 
VirtualBox I have to reboot Linux so that the 
auto(un)mounter works again. So I don't use it a whole lot.

If your windows phones home (Win 7?), it tells M$ the 
hardware it's running on, which will be the VM that 
VirtualBox provides.

Joe
-- 
Joseph Mack NA3T EME(B,D), FM05lw North Carolina
jmack (at) wm7d (dot) net - azimuthal equidistant map
generator at http://www.wm7d.net/azproj.shtml
Homepage http://www.austintek.com/ It's GNU/Linux!



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