Trying to install 13.1 next to Win 7

English Install/Boot/Login
#1

I have installed openSUSE many times with no issues. However, an acquaintance asked me to install 13.1 for them. I could not do it and got stumped.

I apologize in advance. I do not have the Toshiba laptop with me. I do not remember exactly the error message.

They have a Toshiba laptop with a pirated copy of Win 7. It appeared everything was going to go until somewhere around the partitioning screen there was a message that said “installation will fail”, and did. I could not get past the partitioning portion. I usually just click on through and let the installation work itself out and I have never had an issue. Until now. It all stopped and and gave the fail message. I even tried to use the whole hard drive. Still same message.

The acquaintance does not care if Windows is on it the machine, but I am glad I did not destroy his working computer. Fortunately Win 7 still booted up. I simply did not have the time to hang out at his house and research the issue.

It appears as if Win 7 was hogging the whole hard drive or something, and not allowing the install to go through.

I have printed Caf4926 13.1 installation guide for when I go back, and have a Partition Magic DVD (although I barely understand it).

Again, I am sorry I am so vague here. I do not have the laptop with me and told him I will try again sometime. Any ideas, posts, or guides that will get me through this and explain why it is not installing and how to get 13.1 to take. I am still very new in a lot of ways and I am not being successful in search terms within the forum to get better explanations, etc.

I appreciate any directives to follow, knowing I can not test the suggestions until later. Thank You.

#2

The partition layout that exists is the key.
Probably it’s a standard MBR table which can only have a maximum of 4 Primary partitions.

If you get Parted Magic
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/10573557/pmagic_2013_08_01.iso
Take a screen shot of the layout when in the Partition Editor
And post it here

Remember that before you ever shrink space off Windows you should defrag it

Perhaps you friend is prepared to start again with Windows. In which case you could erase the HDD and set out just one NTFS primary for windows… blah blah… but we need to know what you have right now.

#3

If you can boot the installer DVD, and get the output from:


# fdisk -l

that will at least give us something to work with. At present we have too little information.

You should be able to mount a USB, and copy/paste the command output to a file on the USB for later posting.

#4

Thank you nrickert and caf4926. Sometime during the next week I will have a chance to try again. I will defrag Windows first, and post a screen shot from the Partition Editor within Parted Magic. And if possible post the results of fdisk -l

I am hoping he will let me take his machine home to focus until done. Again, thank you both. I will keep you posted as I go.

#5

You should be able to run


# fdisk -l

by opening a terminal when running the Parted Magic disk.