At present I’m dual-booting Vista home premium and Ubuntu Intrepid Ibex.
I want to get rid of Vista and replace it with Suse; can I install Suse while keeping the existing Ubuntu install untouched?
Exitsing partitions are as follows:
Disk /dev/sda: 320.0 GB, 320072933376 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 38913 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x5811fa34
Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 1 23176 186154297 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda2 23177 38913 126407452+ 5 Extended
/dev/sda5 23177 38268 121226458+ 83 Linux
/dev/sda6 38269 38913 5180931 82 Linux swap / Solaris
If you want to delete Vista, simple install openSUSE to the NTFS partition. It doesn’t make any trouble with Ubuntu - except, the boot loader will be replaced.
You can use the already created swap partition for openSUSE too.
Above advice works. Note that currently the Vista boot code is in the MBR. Since you don’t want Vista on the machine any longer, you’ll want to install grub to the MBR. If the installer does not suggest this by default, you can enter the dialog and instruct it to do so. While there, check that openSUSE found the Ubuntu grub menu.lst and added a boot stanza to its menu.lst for booting Ubuntu. Only one distro’s grub and menu.lst can control the booting.
So you are asking in ref to your own machine, not in ref to @blairm’s? And because openSUSE is the only OS on your laptop? If everything is working properly, just leave it be. Having said that, I agree with the dev’s wiki article re grub issues, i.e., when possible it is best to put “generic” boot code in the MBR and grub in the root (or /boot, if separate) partition boot sector assuming that partition is/can be a “primary”. This is especially true with laptops, where manufacturers have been known to do undocumented proprietary things in the MBR or with hidden partitions. Actually, it is likely that you already have the generic code in the MBR; in that case, again, just leave it be.