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alokmahor
April 16th, 2013, 10:55 PM
Hi everyone,

I have to install Linux on one friends laptop without wasting time in backing up or moving data here and there.


the hard disk scene is


/dev/sda

/dev/sda1 of about 100MB which is part of window 7 installation

/dev/sda2 of about 300GB which contains window 7 OS, have lot of free space

/dev/sda3 of about 10GB which is recovery drive

/dev/sda4 of about 100MB which is HP_TOOLS


I will use free space from sda2. but 4 primary partitions are already created so I cant create new partition.


earlier I used to convince people to delete Recovery partition as they had C/DVD's of window and drivers


but some people dont have CD/DVS's of window and drivers so I have to take long time to decide what should I do in this case as I dont want to waste my time in creating recovery DVD's for them.


do anyone have idea how much HP_TOOLS (sda4) is significant? what if I delete this small partition? does this drive contains something important for laptop?


or suggest me what should I do in such cases?


or can we convert primary partition to extended/logical partition?

oldfred
April 16th, 2013, 11:48 PM
Some have said you can backup or copy to main Windows install and restore to a new logical partion and it still works. Supposedly you can also download from HP.

Good advice on how to handle all four primary partitions used. - srs5694
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1686440
Be sure to create recovery DVD(s) first. And a Windows repair CD.
HP tools partition discussion - similar for other vendor partitions:
http://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Notebook-Hardware/Hp-Tools-Partion/td-p/228360
For a complete blow-by-blow on dealing with HP's four partitions, see Full Circle Magazine, issue 41, page 36. - gordintoronto
http://fullcirclemagazine.org/
Shrinking a Windows 7 partition is best done in Windows. But do not create new partitions with Windows.
http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/windows-vista/resize-a-partition-for-free-in-windows-vista/

Still best to have full set of DVDs to restore system or maybe better a full backup.

The vendor recovery DVDs are just an image of your drive as purchased. If you have housecleaned a lot of cruft normally included, run many updates with many reboots, and added software you may want a full back up.
Backup windows before install - post by Mark Phelps
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2040149
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1626990
http://www.macrium.com/reflectfree.asp
Another suggestion by srs5694
http://www.runtime.org/driveimage-xml.htm

Make your own Windows repairCD (not vendor recovery):
http://forums.techarena.in/guides-tutorials/1114725.htm

alokmahor
April 17th, 2013, 12:06 AM
thank you
i will delete hp_tools partition then.