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Here's what I did:
- Run the computer for the first time and followed the automatic os installation
- Formatted the second empty ntfs partition (70Gb)
- Installed ubuntu nbr (jaunty)
- Messed around with partition size to give more to ubuntu.
- Used the computer with dual-boot
- Installed win7RC on the xp partition
Now I want to re-install xp.
Is the ghost utility going to install it on the current xp partition or is it going to wipe out everything ?
Here's my setup:
Disk /dev/sda: 160.0 GB, 160041885696 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 19457 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x9358c633
Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 1 6374 51199123+ 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda2 6375 18813 99916267+ 5 Extended
/dev/sda3 18814 19451 5124735 1c Hidden W95 FAT32 (LBA)
/dev/sda4 19452 19457 48195 ef EFI (FAT-12/16/32)
/dev/sda5 6375 7394 8193118+ 83 Linux
/dev/sda6 7395 18448 88791223+ 83 Linux
/dev/sda7 18449 18813 2931831 82 Linux swap / Solaris
I think it should be alright because in a moment of drowsiness I once booted the PE partition and woke up when I saw a "restoring partitions" message instead of the usual boot messages :] and that only corrupted the ntfs partition without touching grub. But I might be very wrong.
Careful with that.....I know that at least my vista recovery partitions have 2 options that sound nearly identical; one of them reinstalls the partition, the other re-images the whole drive. I highly highly recommend backing up your linux install, just in case. – Babu – 2009-09-19T19:09:51.583
@Col: Thanks. The ghost utility copied the windows pre-installed files on the ntfs partition. I can't confirm it will always does though since someone else's ntfs partition might not be the first one and the ghost utility may create a new partition to solve this. Since it merely copied files to the ntfs partition the procedure didn't erased GRUB. @Babu: Thanks. The ghost utility on 1000HE installs windows xp and when booting the PE partition I was offered one only choice ("installation"). The re-imaging of the whole drive is initiated when pressing F9 when booting the computer. – John Christopher – 2009-09-19T22:59:58.903