[ale] Is it risky?

[DJ-Pfulio]

On 08/28/2015 09:56 PM, John Caruso wrote:
> This last time after about 6 or 7 tries Ubuntu trashed both of my
> hard drives and would not run. I had a backup of Windows 7 taken
> about 3 weeks ago and some of the 7 dvds I used were useless so I
> basically lost everything and did not have Linux afterward. I think
> there is an incompatibility between Win 7 and Linux. Don't know if I
> want to go thru that again.Maybe Linux was not meant to share an OS.
> 

Dual boot is always risky. Always.

Microsoft doesn't want our systems to play nice together, because it is
a little harder and very few people do it.  They think that if it is too
hard, then people will give up and only run the OS which they are most
familiar.  That works for people who aren't committed to Linux.

In the last few years, MSFT has tried to solve some important issues
with their OS. Some of those solutions have NOT been helpful to the
Linux community. SecureBoot and FastBoot come to mind.  Alone, without
Windows, these aren't bad things.  Actually, SecureBoot is part of the
Linux Foundation Workstation recommendations.  It is when both OSes get
involved that complications happen.

Have 1 Win7 system that dual boots with Ubuntu - hardly ever. It is NOT
UEFI.  About once every 6 months, MSFT pushes a boot system patch that
breaks the Linux boot.  Without EFI, fixing it is just a tiny hassle.
The real problem I have it not being allowed to use GPT for the boot
disk - MSFT can't boot off GPT without UEFI AND x64 Win or later.

The last statement is incorrect.  Linux installations have been dual,
triple, quad, 10-way and more booting for decades.  All of this worked
well after we got the hang of it.  There are millions of people doing
the same with UEFI systems today.

Sometimes the hardware involved matters.  For example, there are some
odd UEFI settings that are required to allow OSes before Win8 to boot -
we've seen this mostly from HP laptops, but others may have the issue too.

If you'd like help doing an install, come out to the ALE InstallFest on
9/12. Usually the level of expertise available is fantastic.  For
systems that can support virtualization well, we'll install that way,
unless the owner insists on a dual boot setup. InstallFests are always
lots of fun when thing get going!

BTW, backups aren't backups until the restore has been verified. Before
that happens, they are just 'hope' and hope is NOT a plan.