Partition a Hard Drive without Formatting

[Dropkickmurphys]

Hey, i was wondering if it is possible to partition a HDD without having to format it.

i have an old Laptop which i want to dual boot XP and Ubuntu linux, but it currently only has 1 patition and i dont wanna have to reinstall XP if possible

thanks,

Dave.

 

[AMD Fanboy]

There's some software that will allow you to do that. It's called Partition Magic, but it's pricey. There are others, but i have only had experience with Partition Magic.

 

[Francisck]

you could use Ubuntu wubi, which installs ubuntu inside windows and lets you dual boot with out having to partition the hard drive and it's easy to uninstall.

The new ubuntu "hardy heron" comes with wubi in the cd, just download, burn and pop the cd in while running windows.

Best Regards,
Francisco

 

[Dropkickmurphys]

thanks, but the laptop only has 128mb of memory, so it wont let me run the installer

 

[Francisck]

was that to me or to the post above?

I'm sure wubi doesn't use much ram.

 

[TFT]

There is a free one called GParted that will keep all files intact whilst partitioning, it's here http://gparted.sourceforge.net/

 

[Dropkickmurphys]

was that to me or to the post above?

I'm sure wubi doesn't use much ram.

that was to you, if you read the bottom right hand side of the page it says "256mb ram", i tried it anyway and it wouldnt work.

There is a free one called GParted that will keep all files intact whilst partitioning, it's here http://gparted.sourceforge.net/

thanks, ill give it a go

 

[Francisck]

The I hope the gparted works.