[SOLVED] Help with Linux Dual Boot

gforce6point0 · 2013-12-08 01:46:46

Hi everyone,

I have been dual booting Linux and Windows for quite some time, but I am having some issues wrapping my head around how to dual boot two Linux distros. I downloaded openSUSE 13.1 and dd-ed it to a USB thumb drive. I resized my #! home partition to allow for another / and home partition, but when I attempt to create partition volumes using gparted on the live disk it warns me I can only have 4 main volumes. I read that the sharing of a home drive is usually a bad idea (and in my case mixing different Linux bases, I am sure this is the case). So now my question is this:

1) Am I right in assuming that I need a separate home and / drive? How should I go about creating them and what partitions need to be mounted?

2) Do I also need to utilize a separate swap space?

3) Will Grub2 automatically pick up the two distros?

Thanks.

Last edited by gforce6point0 (2013-12-11 22:18:27)

KrunchTime · 2013-12-08 08:02:24

Hi gforce6point0. I'll try to help you out with your questions.

First, before I answer your specific questions, I want to address the issues you've raised about the limit of 4 main partitions. It is true that you are limited to 4 main partitions, but you can have a number of extended partitions (I'm not sure what the limit is), which is what you should be creating. It sounds like you've created all of your partitions as main partitions. By default, Windows will install on a main partition. When I install Linux distros, I usually setup extended partitions and install them there.

1) You need at least a separate root (/) partition. You do not necessarily need separate /home partitions, although having them may make life a little easier when upgrading to new distro releases. If you setup separate /home partitions, you might want to name them in a way that identifies them with the distro to which they belong; e.g. /home-crunchbang, /home-ubuntu, etc.

2) If by separate swap you mean for each Linux distro you install, technically no. You can use the same swap for each distro. However, if a particular distro crashes or you're forced to give the three-finger salute because of a system freeze in a distro, make sure you reboot into the same distro. I've read that doing otherwise might result in system issues/corruption. Edit: If you have 4gb or more of RAM, you may not need a swap partition. The only thing you would be giving up is the ability to suspend/hibernate under Linux.

3) Depends what you define as "automatically pickup." After installing the second distro, boot back into the first, I'll call this the primary distro, drop to the command line, and enter: sudo update-grub. The next time you reboot, you should see Windows and entries for the two distros in the GRUB boot menu. You'll also need to perform this step if you opt to update to a newer kernel in the second distro.

Also, I'm not going to assume you know, so I'll tell you. When you install the first distro, install GRUB to the master boot record (MBR). When you install the second distro, install GRUB to the root partition that you've selected for that distro.

Lastly, I recommend setting up a separate partition for your data and sharing that partition among Windows and your two (or more) Linux distros.

I hope that this is helpful to you.

Edit: Checkout this post for a how-to on auto-mounting shared partitions, or install and use disk-manager. This will come in handy if you follow my recommendation on setting up a separate data partition. Note, however, that some distros will not need this tip, e.g. Siduction. Some distros will auto-mount some detected partitions.

Last edited by KrunchTime (2013-12-08 08:09:08)

gforce6point0 · 2013-12-08 17:07:02

Alright thanks for the reply. This helps a lot. I just wanted to add that on my current system I only have #! installed. I'm hoping to put openSUSE on as a secondary system for Steam and WINE (which have issues on #! due to older depreciated libs etc.) Whenever Steam decides to release Steam OS I will probably scrub openSuse and use it instead.
I have a few other questions.

1) Does it matter that my #! partitons are all main? Do I need to worry about changing them? I'm assuming that changing these partitions will require a format so I would like to avoid it if possible, at least for the home partition.

2) When I use the openSuse disk to create new partitions should they be both of the same extended type (extended)? What should I choose as my mount points when doing this?

I will read your link and hopefully that will provide answers to most of the rest of my questions.

Last edited by gforce6point0 (2013-12-08 17:14:44)

KrunchTime · 2013-12-09 08:41:31

1) Not really. It would only matter if you install another OS, Linux or otherwise, that requires installation on a main partition and you didn't have any remaining.

2) You are limited to 4 main partitions. I don't know how many you have used because you have not provided that information. Regarding a mount point for openSUSE, I believe that would be the root partition that you create for openSUSE. I'm not familiar with openSUSE, so I don't know its installation routine or options.

KrunchTime · 2013-12-10 09:32:44

If it helps any, here's a screenshot of my partition setup on one of my laptops. I'm dual-booting CrunchBang11 and Siduction Firestarter LXDE. Note that I have the root for both distros setup on main partitions, and everything else is setup on extended partitions.

gforce6point0 · 2013-12-11 05:19:44

GPartedYes, this helps quite a bit. The only problem is that I have 3 main partitions setup (as most likely was the default when I installed openSUSE the first time (I then wrote over the root partition of SUSE with #!). Now I still have 3 main partitions. The problem is I'm fairly sure that changing my home folder to be extended will most likely format the disk.

This is what I currently have in GParted from the SUSE live disk:

GParted Image

When I resize my extended partition I only see the option to add a Logical partition... is this correct? Sounds a bit off...

Last edited by gforce6point0 (2013-12-11 05:34:37)

KrunchTime · 2013-12-11 08:57:57

gforce6point0 wrote:

The only problem is that I have 3 main partitions setup (as most likely was the default when I installed openSUSE the first time (I then wrote over the root partition of SUSE with #!). Now I still have 3 main partitions. The problem is I'm fairly sure that changing my home folder to be extended will most likely format the disk.

You do not have 3 main partitions. You have two active main partitions, an extended partition, a swap partition, and two unallocated main partitions.

gforec6point0 wrote:

When I resize my extended partition I only see the option to add a Logical partition... is this correct? Sounds a bit off...

I believe that is correct. I'm unable to verify because I have no more space to play with on my current laptop hard drive and I don't want to accidentally bork my partitions. A logical partition is basically a fake partition. From Wikipedia: Disk partitioning is the act of dividing a hard disk drive (HDD) into multiple logical storage units referred to as partitions, to treat one physical disk drive as if it were multiple disks.

It's best to plan this out in advance of installing multiple distros. If I were you, I would sit down and figure out exactly what you want to allocate for each distro, to include separate root and home partitions if desired, as well as separate /tmp, swap, and data partitions. Once you have made your decision, use a live distro, containing GParted, on a USB thumb drive and partition the drive. Then re-install CrunchBang and any other distros you desire. I know this is not what you want to hear, but I think it will be best and you will be happier in the long run.

Last edited by KrunchTime (2013-12-11 08:59:02)

gforce6point0 · 2013-12-11 22:16:12

Yup. That's what I figured...it was borked from the original install. I didn't pay attention to the first install because I figured that I would only ever need one Linux OS on my machine. Thanks for your help.

KrunchTime · 2013-12-12 07:57:53

Great to hear you sorted things out. Bravo! big_smile

CrunchBang Linux

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#1 2013-12-08 01:46:46

[SOLVED] Help with Linux Dual Boot

#2 2013-12-08 08:02:24

Re: [SOLVED] Help with Linux Dual Boot

#3 2013-12-08 17:07:02

Re: [SOLVED] Help with Linux Dual Boot

#4 2013-12-09 08:41:31

Re: [SOLVED] Help with Linux Dual Boot

#5 2013-12-10 09:32:44

Re: [SOLVED] Help with Linux Dual Boot

#6 2013-12-11 05:19:44

Re: [SOLVED] Help with Linux Dual Boot

#7 2013-12-11 08:57:57

Re: [SOLVED] Help with Linux Dual Boot

#8 2013-12-11 22:16:12

Re: [SOLVED] Help with Linux Dual Boot

#9 2013-12-12 07:57:53

Re: [SOLVED] Help with Linux Dual Boot

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