Can Linux be installed with Windows 7 OS

[jasmineneedshelp]

Hi guys, I am new to Linux and I have to learn how to use them!

I want to install one of the modern linux distributions, possibly fedora or openSUSE but I want windows 7 to remain as the main Operating system used for work and gaming and linux for educational purpose and experiments.

I do not want to add any hardware components, what options do I have, advantages/disadvantages, recommendations and how i would prepare the system and install linux.

Any help appreciated, thanks in advanced!

 

[Wolfshadw]

Unless you currently have an unpartitioned section of your hard drive available, your best option would be to create a bootable linux CD/DVD. Otherwise, you're looking at either adding a hard drive or re-formatting your current drive and re-partitioning it so you can have a Windows 7 (logical) drive as well as a Linux (logical) drive.

-Wolf sends

 

[cbxbiker61]

Actually the path of least resistance is to install virtual-box and the create a Linux virtual machine. More sophisticated solutions can come after your comfortable with Linux.

 

[Someone Somewhere]

Yup, it's called dual booting.

You'll need to change some settings probably to make Windows the default boot (otherwise you'd need to select it during boot).

There's a whole pile of tutorials around, depending on which OS you want to run. But basically, you'd need to get an ISO from their site, follow the instructions to burn it to a CD/DVD or USB stick, then boot off it. You can try it before you can install it, or even run it entirely off the install media.

If you decide you want to install it, you'd need to shrink the main partition (which windows is on) to make room for the new Linux one. Linux can generally read the Windows data, but not the other way round. You're probably going to want a bigger Windows partition than linux.

I'd suggest making sure that you've made your Windows recovery discs and have a good backup first, though. While it's very rare, it's possible that a partition operation can go wrong.

EDIT: @Wolf, you don't need to format the drive to repartition it.

 

[pauls3743]

I'd go with the virtual box solution. It leaves the parent OS and hard drive completely intact. It give you a sandbox environment where you can try the different versions of Linux with having to keep reformatting your computer, to delete an OS in virtual box is as easy as deleting a file. If you go for a dual boot and fail or want to remove it later you could seriously screw up your computer.

 

[Someone Somewhere]

Yeah, a VM is a good idea.

 

[stillblue]

Just to clarify a point. Linux will not seriously screw up your windows when deleting, at worst you'll have to restore the MBR and as long as you have a recovery disk which you can and should make within win7 then you are safe. Dual booting gives you more performance and makes sharing files easier. VM is a fine way for testing and looking at a variety of versions but if you're going to spend a lot of time in both you're better off with dual booting.

 

[Ijack]

Go for the VM solution, particularly as you say that you just want to experiment at the moment. Resizing partitions and installing different boot loaders offers a host of opportunities to hose your system. I've never heard of anyone left with an unbootable system because they played with a VM.