[Linux-disciples] dual boot on a system that already has linux

[Stephen R Laniel]

On Thu, Jul 12, 2007 at 02:55:45PM -0500, Karl Sokol wrote:
> I have a dual boot system, winxp and ubuntu.  the windows side has an
> unlicensed installation.  I want to install a legal version over it, without it
> messing up my ubuntu install.  Can someone point me to a tutorial on how to
> safely install windows without it interfering with the other partitions?

I'm pretty sure you'll have no problem. What you'd do is
reboot from the Windows CD; it'll ask you which partition
you want to install to, and you'll select the partition that
already has Windows installed. (You should get a list of
partitions, one of which will hopefully be labeled 'Linux'
and another of which will be labeled 'Windows.') It'll go
from there and never touch the Linux one, I believe.

It may ask you whether Windows or Linux should be in charge
of the boot sector. I don't know how to manage that part;
I've never encountered Windows prompting for that sort of
thing. You want Linux to be in charge of the boot sector, if
you have that option.

I wish I had a Windows machine nearby on which to test these
hypotheses, but I don't. And offhand, I don't know of any
tutorials; your Googling skills will be as good as mine.

-- 
Stephen R. Laniel
steve at laniels.org
Cell: +(617) 308-5571
http://laniels.org/
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