hasn't dual booting become complicated?

skim

If you are an IT guy - have you got a copy of partition magic - just resize the partitions, create a new one & away you go.

toasterman

bat999 wrote: »

Now that you've created the recovery disc you're sorted.
When you run out of patience just go down the 'illegal' route.
Then you can always revert back to 'legal' anytime.;) :cool:

Lol. The thought has crossed my mind so many times - why is it so hard to be legal?
I might do it.
Won't get done in the next couple of days though because I need a working pc for this weekend, so it'll stick with just XP at least til Monday.

toasterman

wolfman wrote: »

Yeah this would be the approach I'd (if possible) try.

Split your drive into 4 partitions.

1 - For Windows
2 - Ubuntu
3 - For the SWAP file for Ubuntu
4 - For your files (if you don't have a 2nd hard drive).

Remember to mount your /home directory on another partition (not the Ubuntu one).

I'm just wondering - what is the purpose behind mounting the home directory on another partition? Is this for when I screw up my Linux installation trying to get Beryl/Compiz to work, or is there some other reason for this?

toasterman

skim wrote: »

If you are an IT guy - have you got a copy of partition magic - just resize the partitions, create a new one & away you go.

I do indeed have a COPY of Partition Magic. For once in my life I was trying to stay completely legit without spending any more money or causing myself unnecessary stress. I don't think I can do both though.. as I'm far too lazy to learn new software.

I wonder if users will have as much problem installing Windows on these new Dell pcs that are going to come preinstalled with Ubuntu?
I guess the buyers of said laptop probably won't install Windows.

Moneymaker

toasterman wrote: »

I know. I know.
The quoted battery life is considerably better on Apple laptops too.
And I like OS X.
Problem is, they are that much more expensive - you can't get a macbook for £299 (what I paid for the HP). In the future, when I've more money to spare, I might switch up.

I agree. I've never bought a new Apple Mac and I now have about seven! Keep an eye on Ebay. That's where I buy mine. Unfortunately Mac laptops tend to hold their price but eventually the Intel versions are going to be affordable. The new Intel Mac Mini is already affordable (at least for me).

Bottom line: If you keep wasting money on cheap, unreliable hardware, you'll never be able to afford something better.

toasterman

Moneymaker wrote: »

I agree. I've never bought a new Apple Mac and I now have about seven! Keep an eye on Ebay. That's where I buy mine. Unfortunately Mac laptops tend to hold their price but eventually the Intel versions are going to be affordable. The new Intel Mac Mini is already affordable (at least for me).

Bottom line: If you keep wasting money on cheap, unreliable hardware, you'll never be able to afford something better.

It's true.
I bought this laptop though because I've just cleared my debts. I don't have any money but I am debt free. At least my total fortune is a positive figure now

So I bought this laptop knowing full well I can write it off of the credit card at the end of the month without getting charged any interest.
I couldn't have done that with an £800 macbook.

The mac mini IS very affordable though. If I hadn't built myself a dual core pc last year, and had been looking for something portable, I'd have seriously been thinking about it. For the price they're asking, its really very good value.
And the size of the thing - I'd struggle to make a windows pc that small if I used mini-itx boards.. and it wouldn't be nearly as fast or reliable.


I don't know how to do things on Mac either though - so I might have the same problems I have on Linux. I know Adobe Audition isn't available for mac - is there an equivalent?
The only sound editing I do is a little bit of multitracking (very occasionally), some fading in/out to remove music from my radio shows (again, I'm trying to keep it legal), and cutting/pasting sound samples from one place to another.
Increasing/lowering volumes is a common occurrence, and very very rarely I also use quite basic effects on things recorded.
The "insert silence" feature is handy when something isn't quite the right length, as I can also stretch a 1hour 59mins show to 2 hours.. without it sounding too warped because its only a tiny amount spread out.

I can also record what I'm listening to just by switching the mixer to record stereo wave, and playing something in itunes/realplayer.

Audition is quite flexible and it just seems very straightforward to use.

Audacity falls down because it seems to be crazily hard to zoom in/out (audition uses the mouse scroll wheel), and it gives me hassle when I want to resample stuff to different bit rates, or chose the rates I save in. My radio shows are recorded in 128kbit 44100hz stereo, but when I put it online for the podcast (speech only), its 56kbit, 22050hz, mono. It's something that seems very difficult to do in Audacity, but is extremely easy in Audition/Cooledit.

As Macs are used by people in the media, I'd imagine this sorta stuff is pretty straightforward. I don't know if Garageband does this sorta stuff easily?


P.S. Vista is meant to compete with OS X clearly. They've got photo tools, an improved windows movie maker (which "the gadget show" slated for being awkward to use and very very slow), etc. There's a load of iLife-style things, but there's nothing in Vista to edit sound.. AND Adobe Audition v1 and 2 both f*@k up the Aero theme when you open them.

P.P.S. I do have one beef with Macs actually. iLife sells itself as having a tool that lets you do instant one-click podcasting, publish stuff to iTunes instantly...etc.
What it does say in the very small print is you need a .Mac account to do it - which is another £70 a year for a relatively small amount of space and relatively small amount of monthly bandwidth.
It should really work with any web host. I know it's the Apple way to buy everything from one company, but where web hosting is concerned, I already have hosting and a domain with someone else.

wolfman

toasterman wrote: »

I'm just wondering - what is the purpose behind mounting the home directory on another partition? Is this for when I screw up my Linux installation trying to get Beryl/Compiz to work, or is there some other reason for this?

Yeah. Any apps you install store their settings in the home directory. Hence, if you reinstall, or something goes wrong, all your settings are restored instantly.

toasterman

wolfman wrote: »

Yeah. Any apps you install store their settings in the home directory. Hence, if you reinstall, or something goes wrong, all your settings are restored instantly.

Oh thats handy. So there's no.. "registry" to get screwed up...very good.

tweeter

Does anybody know, if you followed Albertross's suggestion to "install virtual PC, and run linux inside windows", and then you somehow got disabled in Xp by trojan etc, would this setup then be separate enough to run linux in the meantime.

albertross_2

No, if windows was crippled, then virtual PC wouldn't run, you would have to run a dual boot system to avoid that scenario.