Please Help Me Understand the Partitions on My Hard-Drive

whs · 01 Dec 2011

Kado, does VMWare player allow for seemless switching between the host and the guest ??

kado897 · 01 Dec 2011

Yes it does whs. It can run windowed, full screen or in what they call Unity mode which is the same as VirtualBox seamless. The screenshot is Ubuntu 11.10 in windowed mode.

Please Help Me Understand the Partitions on My Hard-Drive-screenshot63_2011-12-01.png

whs · 01 Dec 2011

Sounds good. I have to try that one day. Any other advantages over vBox that you can think of.

kado897 · 01 Dec 2011

whs said:

Sounds good. I have to try that one day. Any other advantages over vBox that you can think of.

Not really. I use both and they have much the same facilities. I find that some thing run better in VBox and others in VMPlayer. The screenshot is Unity running.

Please Help Me Understand the Partitions on My Hard-Drive-screenshot64_2011-12-01.png

whs · 01 Dec 2011

Thanks Kado.

peGGi · 06 Dec 2011

Thank you, Corazon, for that explanation. Makes sense :)

peGGi · 06 Dec 2011

Thanks for the advice everyone.

Kado - I like your virtual machine suggestion. It looks promising. Can you answer a few questions for me first though before I try it?

If I install a Linux distro using VMWare, will I still have to download all the drivers that Linux needs (for graphics, wireless, etc.) And if so, could these drivers interfere with my Windows drivers? I ask because I was trying Ubuntu on a Live USB on Friday, and had trouble getting wireless working on it. I did eventually, but when I re-booted into Windows, wireless wasn't working. It had totally screwed up my wireless profiles in Windows and even on my router. I had to get assistance from Netgear's tech support to sort it out!

In the installation instructions, it shows that you have to assign some RAM to Windows and some to Linux. I have 6 Gb RAM. Say I install with 4Gb to Linux and 2 Gb to Windows, does that mean the maximum RAM Linux can access is 4 Gb? And will Windows still have the full 6 Gb when VMWare isn't running?

Finally, is it easy to uninstall VMWare &/or the Linux distro?

kado897 · 06 Dec 2011

You should have no problems with installing most Linux distros in VMware Player.

To install VMPlayer just download the installer and install it like any other program. I think it may ask you to reboot before you use it.

Once you have it installed all you need to do is download the Ubuntu ISO, create a new VM in the player using a wizard, attach the Ubuntu ISO to the VMs virtual CD drive and play the machine and the installation will be done for you including the installation of special drivers to make it run better as a VM. This works for the common Linux distros and for versions of Windows including the W8 developer preview.

You can create as many VMs as you like but I think the free version of the player can only run one at a time.

You don't usually have to worry about drivers as the VM will handle that. There should be no problem with internet access as the VM uses the host to supply that.

The VM will obviously use CPU cycles from the host but usually runs well in combination with other programs. One thing to be aware of is that any memory you assign to the running VM will not be available to other programs. Any virtual disks that the VM needs are just files to the host system, there is no need for extra partitions.

One further thing. I have found that 32bit guests run better than 64bit ones even on a 64bit Host.

gregrocker · 06 Dec 2011

Hi Peggi -

Researching the Lenovo partition it appears that any changes to the partition structure will cause Lenovo One-Key Recovery Button to not work: Installing Windows 7-Can I Dlete Lenovo Partition? - Lenovo Community

However with WIn7's built-in backup imaging you can save externally your own image backup of your personalized setup that can be run from System Recovery Options to reimage the HD or its replacement in 20 minutes:
Backup Complete Computer - Create an Image Backup
System Image Recovery

So if you decide to Dual Boot with Ubuntu, you can go ahead and delete the Lenovo partition which only contains drivers that are already installed and can be backed up at windows/system32/drivers, and are also available and may have newer versions on the Lenovo Support Downloads webpage for your model. Partition or Volume - Delete

You can then shrink C in Disk Management to create new Logical partitions as you wish in the shrink space: Partition or Volume - Shrink
Partition or Volume - Create New

If you need more flexibility to resize from the left or anything else Disk Management can't do, use free Partition Wizard bootable CD.

Dual-Boot Windows 7 and Ubuntu in Perfect Harmony - windows 7 - Lifehacker

Tips to Clean up factory bloatware.

peGGi · 06 Dec 2011

Thanks Kado. Sounds great. I think I will give it a try. I might go with dual-boot further down the road, depending on how well (or not) virtual Linux works.

Thanks for your input Gregrocker. I had discovered that any changes to any partitions makes Lenovo's OKR not work (which makes it a bit crap in my opinion - you can't change any of your partitions? Very restrictive, Lenovo) so yeah I know you'd have to give up on OKR. I back up with Windows and EaseUs anyway (back-up overkill maybe...) so don't need it. I'm slightly concerned though that it might invalidate my Lenovo warranty if I change partitions and abandon OKR (thought I read that somewhere) so need to research that a bit....

I'm going to mark this as solved as I feel that I now understand my partitions and understand how to re-partition, what that entails, and the potential consequences. So thanks all contributors! Super helpful and friendly (and didn't make me feel like an idiot). This is a great forum :)