How to install windows8 along side of Ubuntu 13.04?

[nachinew]

Hi,

I am new to Ubuntu which is Preinstalled in my laptop and currently i am loving this Os apart from Windows. But in some case windows is necessary for official use. So i plan to installed Windows OS along Side of Preinstalled of Ubuntu. Please share your view and instruct me to install successfully.

[oldfred]

Is your system installed in UEFI mode with gpt partitioning or in BIOS mode? And in BIOS mode Ubuntu can be either gpt or MBR(msdos).
Windows will only boot from gpt partitioned drives with UEFI and both Ubuntu and Windows need to be UEFI.

If Ubuntu is in BIOS mode on MBR partitioned drives you need to install Windows in BIOS mode, but may have the 4 primary partition issue. Windows has to be installed to a primary partition (sda1 thru sda4), formatted NTFS with the boot flag for BIOS boot.

[nachinew]

Is your system installed in UEFI mode with gpt partitioning or in BIOS mode? And in BIOS mode Ubuntu can be either gpt or MBR(msdos).
Windows will only boot from gpt partitioned drives with UEFI and both Ubuntu and Windows need to be UEFI.

If Ubuntu is in BIOS mode on MBR partitioned drives you need to install Windows in BIOS mode, but may have the 4 primary partition issue. Windows has to be installed to a primary partition (sda1 thru sda4), formatted NTFS with the boot flag for BIOS boot.

Hi,
Thanks for your help.
I am new to things UEFI, gpt, MBR...etc
Can you explain simple and short how to find my system installed in UEFI mode (Is i need to Go to check in BIOS setting?)

[oldfred]

UEFI/BIOS has both settings. Run this command and if it shows gpt and you have an efi partition you are in UEFI mode. If gpt and a unformatted bios_grub 1MB partition you have gpt with BIOS. If it shows msdos then you are in BIOS mode.

I have BIOS and gpt on several drives.

fred@fred-Precise:~$ sudo parted -l
[sudo] password for fred: 
Model: ATA MAXTOR STM316081 (scsi)
Disk /dev/sda: 160GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: msdos

Number  Start   End     Size    Type     File system  Flags
 1      32.3kB  59.0GB  59.0GB  primary  ntfs         boot
 4      59.0GB  80.0GB  21.0GB  primary  fat32
 2      80.0GB  160GB   80.0GB  primary  ext3


Model: ATA MAXTOR STM316081 (scsi)
Disk /dev/sdb: 160GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: gpt

Number  Start   End     Size    File system     Name      Flags
 1      17.4kB  8225kB  8208kB                            bios_grub
 2      8225kB  26.2GB  26.2GB  ext4            MAVERICK
 3      26.2GB  29.4GB  3142MB  linux-swap(v1)
 4      29.4GB  160GB   131GB   ext4

[nachinew]

UEFI/BIOS has both settings. Run this command and if it shows gpt and you have an efi partition you are in UEFI mode. If gpt and a unformatted bios_grub 1MB partition you have gpt with BIOS. If it shows msdos then you are in BIOS mode.

I have BIOS and gpt on several drives.

fred@fred-Precise:~$ sudo parted -l
[sudo] password for fred: 
Model: ATA MAXTOR STM316081 (scsi)
Disk /dev/sda: 160GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: msdos

Number  Start   End     Size    Type     File system  Flags
 1      32.3kB  59.0GB  59.0GB  primary  ntfs         boot
 4      59.0GB  80.0GB  21.0GB  primary  fat32
 2      80.0GB  160GB   80.0GB  primary  ext3


Model: ATA MAXTOR STM316081 (scsi)
Disk /dev/sdb: 160GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: gpt

Number  Start   End     Size    File system     Name      Flags
 1      17.4kB  8225kB  8208kB                            bios_grub
 2      8225kB  26.2GB  26.2GB  ext4            MAVERICK
 3      26.2GB  29.4GB  3142MB  linux-swap(v1)
 4      29.4GB  160GB   131GB   ext4

Confirmed am in msdos partition table. Next what should I do

[oldfred]

What partitions have your used? Post your sudo parted -l?

Windows will only install to a primary (sda1 thru sda4) partition formatted NTFS with the boot flag. Some format NTFS with gparted, but find they need to reformat from Windows first.

How large do you want to make Windows. Will you have data you may want to see in both systems. I generally like smaller system partitions and larger shared data partitions. If you want a shared data partition it should be NTFS, but does not have to be primary.

[nachinew]

What partitions have your used? Post your sudo parted -l?

Windows will only install to a primary (sda1 thru sda4) partition formatted NTFS with the boot flag. Some format NTFS with gparted, but find they need to reformat from Windows first.

How large do you want to make Windows. Will you have data you may want to see in both systems. I generally like smaller system partitions and larger shared data partitions. If you want a shared data partition it should be NTFS, but does not have to be primary.

Here is my parted details

Model: ATA Hitachi HTS54505 (scsi)
Disk /dev/sda: 500GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/4096B
Partition Table: msdos

Number Start End Size Type File system Flags
1 1049kB 316MB 315MB primary fat32 diag
2 316MB 3537MB 3221MB primary fat32 lba
3 3537MB 218GB 215GB primary ext4 boot
4 218GB 500GB 282GB primary ntfs


Warning: Unable to open /dev/sr0 read-write (Read-only file system). /dev/sr0
has been opened read-only.
Error: /dev/sr0: unrecognised disk label


Is I need to install in windows in logical partition?
I need less partition space and large shared data partition as you said.

[oldfred]

Windows will not boot from a logical partition, it only boots from a primary partition (sda1 thru sda4) formatted NTFS with the boot flag. I see you have boot flag on the ext4 partition. Grub does not use boot flag, so you should move it back to the NTFS partition.

I do not like having the Windows NTFS partition after an extended partition as sometimes Windows repairs do not rewrite partition table correctly as it does not see the Linux partitions. But your partition layout makes it difficult to reorganize.
You can only have one extended partition to hold all the logical partitions. So you can convert with fixparts sda3 to a primary and make the current sda3 as a logical sda5. Since Ubuntu uses UUID, that should not break it but good backups of all your data are important with any major system change.

First backup partition table, use your drive for sdX or sda, sdb etc.
sudo sfdisk -d /dev/sda > parts_sda.txt

To convert a partition from primary to logical, at least one free (unallocated) sector must exist between the partition and the one that precedes it.
Fixparts - Repair broken partition tables (not overlapping issues) & delete Stray gpt data from MBR drives
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.p...7#post10367957
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1705325
http://www.rodsbooks.com/fixparts/

[nachinew]

Windows will not boot from a logical partition, it only boots from a primary partition (sda1 thru sda4) formatted NTFS with the boot flag. I see you have boot flag on the ext4 partition. Grub does not use boot flag, so you should move it back to the NTFS partition.

I do not like having the Windows NTFS partition after an extended partition as sometimes Windows repairs do not rewrite partition table correctly as it does not see the Linux partitions. But your partition layout makes it difficult to reorganize.
You can only have one extended partition to hold all the logical partitions. So you can convert with fixparts sda3 to a primary and make the current sda3 as a logical sda5. Since Ubuntu uses UUID, that should not break it but good backups of all your data are important with any major system change.

First backup partition table, use your drive for sdX or sda, sdb etc.
sudo sfdisk -d /dev/sda > parts_sda.txt

To convert a partition from primary to logical, at least one free (unallocated) sector must exist between the partition and the one that precedes it.
Fixparts - Repair broken partition tables (not overlapping issues) & delete Stray gpt data from MBR drives
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.p...7#post10367957
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1705325
http://www.rodsbooks.com/fixparts/

Thanks for your reply friend.
So before preceding this link i want to ask a few questions.

Please see my GUI view of Gparted.
I have some question to ask

1. Partition (sd1) Is really need Dell utility present or in future or we can delete it.
2. OS is installed in this partition (sd2) is UBUNTU OS right?
3. If we delete this partition (sd3) means does UBUNTU boot with out fails.
4. This is the partition (sd4) using NTFS.
the following question may be silly to friend but i am a beginner for this.
Don`t hesitate to answer.

[oldfred]

I do not know what sda2 is.

Usually vendors use 4 partitions, vendor recovery (image of system to restore to like new), Windows boot/repair/recovery, Windows system, and vendor tools. Tools may be utilities to do hard ware type or system checking or configuration with Windows.

I would backup any partition you may want to delete, but it seems only sda3 is Ubuntu and sda4 is Windows and Windows does not have the separate Boot partition.