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How to dual-boot Fedora 14 and Windows 7

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FedoraHow to dual-boot Fedora 14 and Windows 7 is next in a series of articles on dual-booting Windows and Linux distributions. The first was how to dual boot Ubuntu 10.10 and Windows 7. That article gave detailed instructions on how to dual-boot, with GRUB, the Linux bootloader, installed on the Master Boot Record (MBR) of the hard disk. This article will show how to dual-boot by letting the Windows Boot Manager take care of the dual-booting responsibilities. The method used here is a lot easier than that suggested by a commenter here. The actual reason behind this approach is to prevent Windows from messing with GRUB when it (Windows) is updated/upgraded.

The first task is to create Windows partitions, leaving some unallocated space for installing Fedora 14. When dual-booting Windows and Linux, this is the recommended method. It is safer than exposing the whole disk to Windows and letting the Linux installer make room for installing Linux by shrinking the space used by Windows. Note: To make taking screenshots a lot easier, the images used in this tutorial came from a virtual installation, with a disk space of about 92 GB.

To start, boot the computer using the Windows 7 installation disk. The disk partitioning step is shown in the image below. To create the Windows partitions, click on New.

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Disk under Windows installer

The available size of the hard drive will be presented in an editable field. Knowing that a new installation of Windows 7 takes up about 7 GB of disk space, any value higher than this should be sufficient. For this tutorial, I chose to allocate 30 GB to Windows.

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Edit partition size

Here is the new size for Windows. Click Apply.

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Specify partition size

The Windows partitioner will create two partitions. The first, 100 MB in size, is for the /boot partition, and the second is the main Windows 7 partition. The unallocated space will be used for installing Fedora 14. Click Next to install Windows.

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Continue installation

After Windows installation has completed, reboot into the Fedora 14 installation CD or DVD. For this tutorial, I used the DVD installation image. Click until you get to the step shown in the image below. Because the disk has been partitioned to create a free space, untouched by Windows, the option to select here is “Use Free Space.” If you want to add a physical security layer to your Fedora 14 installation, enable “Encrypt system.” See how Fedora protects your computer with full disk encryption for the benefit of this option.

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Fedora 14 partition methods

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reza
reza
11 years ago

hi
I have install a linux fedora 13 and dual boot it with windows 7, I have receive the congratulation from linux to install it when the instalation proceces complete, but when I want to choose the linux from my OS options(linux&windows)it dose not run and the pc restart!
I have install it exactly from your help(these 4 pages).
what is the problem, and, what should I do?
with kindest regards

Naveen
Naveen
12 years ago

Sir,

This is a good tutorial… but I have a doubt… I had to install Fedora 14 and I formatted my complete PC (Windows was also removed) and used up all 320 GB for Fedora… Now, Since I have Fedora 14 installed… can I somehow install Windows 7?… Please help me…

Naveen
Naveen
Reply to  finid
12 years ago

Sir,

yes thats an alternative… but installing Fedora and setting up the complete environment for my work… Netbeans My SQL and all took a lot of time and I dont want to do it again… plz if u could suggest smthn…

Naveen
Naveen
Reply to  finid
12 years ago

hey,

Thanks for the reply… I think I wud get another disk and install win7… thats the most oblivious choice I shud make 🙂

Andrew
Andrew
12 years ago

Thanks for this usefull tutorial. I install fedora 14 on a Dell Inspiron 1520 with windows 7 and work very well. God bless you !

adithyajones
adithyajones
12 years ago

I am trying to dual boot WindowsXp and Fedora15..For that purpose I partitioned hard disk using Easeus partitioning tool.Here is the partitions from left to right-C drive-primary partition(90GB),unallocated space(11GB),D drive-logical drive(30GB),7GB-primary partition(ESIA),unallocated space-8GB..There are unallocated space of 11GB and 8GB in the system,but when I run the option “Use Free Space” it is showing as no space available..

Sumesh
Sumesh
12 years ago

Excellent article – the most helpful guide I have seen so far. I followed the instructions and was able to get the dual boot configured for Fedora 15 and windows 7.

Siva
Siva
Reply to  Sumesh
12 years ago

I’m still fighting, what kind of disk you have? Raid?

Siva
Siva
Reply to  Siva
12 years ago

Solved, read below 🙂

Siva
Siva
12 years ago

I followed your instructions but didn’t work (I just did not reviewed linux partitions, left as they were), when I boot to fedora I just see a never ending blinking cursor in the top left (but I can boot to Windows 7, of course).

Maybe because the 3rd partition (Fedora /boot with grub at the beginning) begins after 1 TB? (I think this is the reason)

Or maybe because it does not work good on a RAID 1 (2 x 2 TB)?

p1: 100 MB Windows boot
p2: 1 TB Windows C: drive
p3: 500 MB /boot
p4: Fedora LVM

TX

Siva
Siva
Reply to  finid
12 years ago

I had already tried that option 🙁
News: I booted to Fedora 14 install media rescue mode and tried to reinstall grub, this is the problem:

grub> root (hd0,2)
Error 18: Selected cylinder exceeds maximum supported by BIOS

BIOS is updated, mb is a ASUS P8P67 EVO, problem seems to be the old 1024 cylinders limit (???)

Could it be a grub 1.x problem? And tx for your support…

Siva
Siva
Reply to  finid
12 years ago

SOLVED – well to tell the truth I had to surrend, old error = old method. As I suspected the reason was that linux boot partition started too far, I just moved it before Windows 7 partition and now it works.

– To resume –
Old situation (ERROR 18):
p1: 100 MB Windows boot
p2: 1 TB Windows C: drive
p3: 500 MB /boot
p4: Fedora LVM

New situation (OK)
p1: 100 MB Windows boot
p2: 500 MB /boot
p3: 1 TB Windows C: drive
p4: Fedora LVM

and used your method 🙂
Tx

p.s. it works with Fedora 15 too

sudeb
sudeb
12 years ago

When i try to install fedora 14 to my 34 gb free space at the time of partitioning the message show tha t”could not mount not enough disk space” , i have 320 gb sata hdd and windows7 home basic

Vinayak
12 years ago

i have 500gb hard drive
c drive 100
and d drive rest of the space(containing my data)
i want install fedora 14 by dvd.. (it is not live)
i am confusing in choosing

WHICH TYPE OF INSTALLATION WOULD YOU LIKE?

Please suggest me clearly step by step…
please i tried, i am not getting… please

Brane
Brane
12 years ago

Thanks, you helped me a lot!

Chewy
Chewy
12 years ago

This was VERY helpful. I was able to configure my PC for dual boot (into Windows or Fedora) specifically using these instructions. It worked flawlessly. Thanks.

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