Ubuntu ultrabook installation and disk partitions

[lukasz6]

I was doing some research about dual booting Ubuntu on an Acer aspire s7-392 and decided to take a look at the current disk partitions.
My drive is a 128gb SSD but only 104GB are used for the main partition.
There are four other partitions:
100MB (this is the EFI one)
350MB
400MB
14.29GB
The last three are all 100% empty and are all labelled as recovery partitions (no more info). Is it safe to get rid of them and install ubuntu in their place, instead of re-sizing the windows partition?

[oldfred]

No or maybe.
Windows has to have certain partitions. If you have made a full DVD set of the recovery partition then you can consider removing the recovery partition. The Windows recovery should have the Windows repair tools, you can and should anyway make a repair flash drive. And the vendor recovery is an image of hard drive as brand new, not not a full reinstaller.

Microsoft suggested partitions including reserved partition for gpt & UEFI:
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd744301%28WS.10%29.aspx
Older Windows info on gpt - 2008 updated 2011
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/hardware/gg463525.aspx
Windows technical info on gpt and GUIDs
http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/windows/desktop/aa365449
Order on drive is important: msftres
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Reserved_Partition


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=2137439&p=12611710#post12611710
http://www.macrium.com/reflectfree.asp
Another suggestion by srs5694
http://www.runtime.org/driveimage-xml.htm


Windows 8 UEFI repair USB must be FAT32, not for reinstall, just repairs
http://www.eightforums.com/tutorials/2855-system-repair-disc-create-windows-8-a.html
http://www.winhelp.us/create-a-recovery-drive-in-windows-8.html#USB
http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/samsungpcgeneral/thread/e7ed293e-b565-44ee-a536-166dddf32205/
http://www.ghacks.net/2012/11/01/how-to-create-a-windows-8-system-repair-disc/

Use Windows own partition tools to shrink Windows partition and reboot so it can run chkdsk. Do not create partitions with Windows as it may convert to dynamic partitions.


Shows install with screen shots for both BIOS & UEFI, so you know which you are using.
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/UEFI
Also shows Windows 8 screens
http://askubuntu.com/questions/221835/installing-ubuntu-on-a-pre-installed-uefi-supported-windows-8-system