AKICILJ Building a dual boot Ubuntu/Windows XP box

[cobrabay]

I need to do this on a box which currently has neither. Which would be easier, XP then Ubuntu, or Ubuntu then XP? If it makes a difference, Ubuntu will be the long term primary OS. It's ages since I've built a dual boot box, and I don't have time to experiment.

Comments

[akicif]

I've always done Windows first, then Ubuntu .... And the Ubuntu doc backs this up:

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/WindowsDualBoot

[sbisson]

Yes, I'd agree with that - especially as you can then use Wubi to launch Ubuntu from inside Windows.

[autopope]

XP doesn't play nice with other OSs -- it tries to overwrite the boot sector. So SOP is to install XP first -- after partitioning so that it doesn't hog the entire disk -- then add Ubuntu, which uses a boot loader (GRUB 2 unless they've changed in the past year) that automatically offers you a menu, including Windows XP.

Wubi ... no, not really; you're running Linux out of a partition embedded in a file in the NTFS filesystem, which is less than optimal.

VirtualBox might be a better solution than dual booting, if memory (and CPU) permits.

[dougs]

Me too. The Windows installation is more-or-less guaranteed to toast your grub boot sector.

I've occasionally started by booting into the Ubuntu live CD (or live USB) just to do the partitioning, to give my "main" OS the earlier partitions, then install Windows on the later partition, and then install Linux on the earlier partition (and grub on the boot sector). If I'm not fussed about the order of partitions, I just let Windows grab partition 1 and Linux have the rest.

[gaspode]

Yep windows first. But I just run all my linux on VMware desktop.

[cobrabay]

Thanks for all the advice, looks like XP first it is. This a fairly low power box at the moment so I'm not keen on running as a VM, even though I do plan to upgrade the memory before too long.