What do I get rid of to install Ubuntu when I have 4 primary partitions?

Question

I am very new to Ubuntu and Linux in general, so any advice is appreciated. I am following the "Dual-Boot Windows 7 and Ubuntu in Perfect Harmony" tutorial on Lifehacker to do exactly that. This is the link. I am at the step of partitioning my system, I already have windows installed but i am in the Ubuntu Live. When i go into the GParted Partition Editor and try and select "new" I get this message:

It is not possible to create more than 4 primary partitions.

If you want more partitions you should first create an extended partition. Such a partition can contain other partitions. Because an extended partition is also a primary partition it might be necessary to remove a primary partition first

Thats all!

Wow! Ubuntu's community is amazing, i was expecting at least a day wait for an answer. Anyways, here is the picture:

Also, i forgot to tell you, but i am on a laptop for this project, if that changes anything.

thanks for all of you help so far!

Answer 1

Disclaimer: always take a current backup of your hard disk prior to playing around with partitions.

Note1: GParted "records" the actions that we're doing, so it's not actually creating or deleting any partitions until we hit Apply. So, if you mess up before applying, just undo or close and reopen GParted.

Note2: your screenshot shows a low battery. Ensure that your laptop is plugged into a power source and charging.

1. Copy all the contents of the Data partition to your C drive, or to an external storage device, because we're going to delete it. You can do this normally in Windows, or you can do this in Live Ubuntu. In Live Ubuntu, if you move your mouse to the bottom of the Launcher on the left, you'll find a couple of hard disk icons. Clicking them will mount and open up the partitions.

2. In Live Ubuntu, open up GParted. Right click and "Unmount" the partitions if you opened them up (if you followed the previous step).

3. Right click on sda4 > Delete.

4. Right click on the now large unallocated > New:

   • Create as: Extended Partition
   • Click Add.

5. Right click on the new unallocated (which is nested under "New Partition") > New:

   • Create as: Logical Partition (you shouldn't be able to change it anyways.)
   • File system: ntfs
   • Label: Data
   • Free space preceding: 0
   • New size: 181524
     • This is 177 GB. You can of course, change it to however big you want your new Data partition to be.
   • When you click away, the Free space following should fill up automatically.
   • Click Add.

   It should now look like this:

   sda1
   sda2
   sda3
   New Partition
         New Partition (Data)       177.27 GB
         unallocated                119 GB
   

6. Take a look at your partitions. Cross your fingers. Pray. Take another look. If you're satisfied, click the green check mark in GParted to apply. This shouldn't take too long, maybe 10 minutes maximum...probably take a few seconds =/.

7. At this point, you can boot back into Windows and copy back your Data stuff, or continue with installing Ubuntu since you're already in Live Ubuntu.

Now, you have an unallocated space that can be used to create new partitions and install Ubuntu.

There are several ways from here to install Ubuntu. I would highly advise this:

1. Click on the Install Ubuntu to Hard Disk icon in the Launcher on the left (second icon from top).
2. When presented with options, choose Install Ubuntu alongside Windows 7. This will basically take care of everything. It will detect the free, unallocated space, and install itself there, along with creating an essential partition called swap. It will not touch your other Windows partitions. The only thing that can go wrong here is bootloader stuff, where you might not get a screen to "choose" which OS, and it just boots into Ubuntu or Windows. This can be fixed using Boot-Repair, but I doubt that it'll get to this point.
3. When it's done, reboot your computer (and don't forget to remove your USB/CD so that you don't boot into Live Ubuntu), and you should be presented with options to choose your OS. At this point, I like to first boot into Windows to make sure that it boots successfully. When it does, shutdown and boot into Ubuntu...and enjoy.

Answer 2

You can use my FixParts program to convert your current /dev/sda4 partition from primary to logical, which will automatically create a containing extended partition in the process. You might then need to reboot and use GParted to resize the extended partition to cover all the disk's free space so that the Ubuntu installer can use it. This procedure is likely to be much less of a hassle than what Alaa has outlined. I do agree with his recommendation to back up your data, though -- any partition manipulation is inherently at least a little risky and can result in massive data loss. Although that risk is low, the cost of recovery can be very high, so having a backup is a worthwhile precaution.

Answer 3

The ubuntu dualboot will detect the unallocated space and install ubuntu on that part.

If you are using windows 7 there is a partition tool (search for it in the startbutton meny) where you can handle your partitions and resize them.