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What Microsoft Must Change for Windows 7

Will Smith — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 12:45:30 -0500

By now, we’ve got a pretty good idea of what’s working and what isn’t in Vista. Here are our recommendations for how Microsoft should proceed with Windows 7

Fight Piracy in a New Way

Face it, activation is a failure. For power users who frequently upgrade their PCs, dialing in to reactivate the OS is beyond irritating. Instead, Microsoft must come up with a novel way to punish pirates without annoying its paying customers. (May we suggest displaying massive popup ads in pirate copies of Windows?) For legitimate customers, a realistic home-licensing program—buy one copy at full price, get four more upgrades for $50 to $100 each—would go a long way toward creating goodwill.

Streamline the UAC System

We definitely approve of the spirit behind User Account Control—it’s good to warn users when they’re doing something risky. However, the implementation is so chatty that it trains users to automatically click Approve on any popup they see. This is insanely dangerous behavior that must be fixed in Windows 7.

Add Something Inspirational

Say what you like about Steve Jobs, but he stirs the Apple faithful into a frenzy with his promise of “one more thing.” Apple has done a great job of adding features, applications, and functionality to OS X that inspire its users. Some of that is just marketing mumbo jumbo, but the tight integration and the user-focused design of Apple’s integrated apps impress even the most die-hard PC user.

64-Bit is the New 32-Bit

It’s time. The 64-bit revolution is upon us, and it’s time for Microsoft to lead the charge. The hardware is available and common, and software vendors should have been planning for the 64-bit change for the last five years. Please, Microsoft, make the 64-bit edition of Windows 7 the default install. And while you’re at it, allow users to install the 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Windows on the same machine without buying two licenses. Anything less is just crass.

Create Fewer Versions

We understand that creating many versions of an OS with a few key differentiators can help drive sales at the higher end. But it’s a viciously consumer-unfriendly practice that needs to be stopped. Nothing’s worse than finding out you’ve purchased the wrong software or that because of obscure upgrade paths you’re railroaded into buying an incredibly overpriced version of the OS whose only differentiating factor is that it works with your rig. Actually, one thing is worse: finding out you can’t return that already opened Vista box for a version you can use.

Jettison Backward Compatibility

So many of Vista’s problems are directly tied to backward compatibility, but we have the perfect solution. Instead of building backward compatibility into the OS, ship each copy of Windows with Virtual PC and bare-bones images of Windows XP. Let users run old apps in a virtualized OS, and strip out all the cruft that’s required to make them run natively in Windows 7.

Make Performance Paramount

We expect to take a small performance hit in games anytime we upgrade our operating system. We don’t like it, but we understand that it’s the way things go. What we can’t abide is taking massive performance penalties in basic computing tasks—like transferring files over a network. There’s no wiggle room on this one: Get it right the first time.

Upgrade DirectSound3D

A picture may be worth 1,000 words, but we like good audio too. There’s more than enough blame to pass around between Creative and Microsoft for Vista’s sound woes. At this point, we don’t care who is at fault, we just want a successor to DirectSound 3D in the next version of Windows and DirectX.

How To: Protect Any PC Using Windows Steady State

Justin Kerr — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 12:00:00 -0500

One of the biggest challenges Maximum PC readers often face is the never ending battle we endure when it comes to restoring the PC’s of family and friends. We often find ourselves bombarded with machines that may have once been configured by us, but have become infected or modified beyond recognition. The good news is that Microsoft finally has a solution and it comes in the form of a free add on for Windows XP and Vista which promises to restore sanity to your world.

Windows Steady State goes far beyond a simple group policy editor. It gives users the protection and peace of mind that until now could only be matched by a virtual machine. Simply put, Windows Steady State gives you nearly unlimited control over what can and cannot be done on a protected PC. With the ability to flush unwanted changes with each reboot every new session can be as fresh and snappy as the day you first installed the OS.

The obvious application for Steady State is anyone who maintains a large fleet of public computers, but I would argue that it works just as well for anyone who maintains a troublesome household computer with friends or family who just can’t resist opening email attachments. Steady State gives administrators full control over how users access the internet, how they import and export data, and even what programs they can use. Interested in learning how to master this amazing new utility? Read on to learn how to configure Steady State for your application.

What you'll Need:

A PC With Windows XP (Any 32 Bit Edition) or Windows Vista (Any 32 Bit Edition) The Operating System Must be Installed on an NTFS partition.
4 GB of Free Disk Space
The Windows Steady State Installer
30 Minutes

1.) Download and Install Windows Steady State

First things first, you will need to point your browser over to Microsoft and download your free copy of Windows Steady State. For those of you using Firefox (which I’m guessing is most of our readers), you may want to consider using Internet Explorer for this step. Microsoft will validate your copy of Windows to ensure it is genuine both before downloading and again during installation. Internet Explorer makes this first step easier since a one click ActiveX control makes the process pretty transparent. You can use Firefox, Safari, or just about anything else you can think of, but you’ll just have to jump through a few extra hoops in order to validate.

Once you have downloaded the installer go ahead and launch it when you’re ready. The installer doesn’t offer any installation options to configure, so we won’t bother walking you through the process of clicking next. I would however caution you to go slow and watch for the option to opt out of the Live Tool bar if you don’t want it.

2.) Protect The Hard Disk OPTIONAL

Double click the Windows Steady State Icon on your desktop (shown here) which will launch the application into the main menu screen shown above. Once the interface is up and running click the Protect The Hard Disk option which is circled in red on our screen shot.

**WARNING**

Protecting the hard disk has known (but undocumented) issues with whole drive encryption technologies such as True Crypt. Users with encrypted drives should not use this feature and should skip ahead to step 3.

Even though this step is listed as optional, protecting the hard disk is one the most powerful features in Windows Steady State. When enabled disk protection earmarks a chunk of your free disk space (50% by default) and forms a cache where modified files will be stored during a users session. To be clear, Steady State isn’t creating an image of your hard drive, it simply quarantines any files that are modified during a user’s session to the cache.

When the operating system needs to read a file from the hard drive it first checks the cache to see if a modified version already exists, and if not, retrieves it from the protected section. Since the cache only contains modified copies of the protected files, when the machine is rebooted the cache is easily dumped and your computer will once again rebuild it as changes are made. This protection applies to the entire windows partition and cannot be customized to exclude individual folders. If you require persistent storage, data will need to be stored on a separate drive or partition.

Separate partitions are ignored by steady state and can be interacted with normally. If you find yourself wishing you’d had the foresight to create a separate partition on the machine in question, but don’t want to reformat and start over have no fear. We have a how to guide for that too. If you choose not to use the disk protection feature that is of course your choice. But if you’re serious about protecting the PC from users who don’t need to install new software very often it’s the safest bet. If you choose not to use disk protection, the privileges you grant your users in later steps will need to be much more draconian in order to compensate for this feature not being active. With hard disk protection enabled any mischief a user gets himself into will be wiped clean with every reboot.

After clicking the protect hard disk option you should see the screen shown above. Here is a breakdown of what each option does.

Remove All Changes At Restart – This is the easiest way to lock down a PC with Steady State. Each time the machine resets, it clears the cache and things are restored to whatever state it was in when you activated this feature. When you turn this on for the first time it will warn you that it needs to create the cache and restart. By default it will use 50% of your remaining free space.

Retain Changes Temporarily – If you want changes to be persistent throughout the day this option would allow you to maintain state for a set period. This is helpful in an office environment where users could be warned that data on the windows partition will be wiped daily.

Retain All Changes Permanently – This turns off the cache feature but maintains the space it allocated during setup. This is helpful if an administrator wants to make permanent changes to a limited user account that won’t be wiped upon reboot. Once those changes are complete however, don’t forget to revert to a protected mode.

Change Cache File Size – By default Steady State will grab 50% of your available disk space, which if you have a massive 500 GB drive with nothing but windows on it, can be somewhat exessive. The cache only needs to be large enough to contain changes that will be made during an individual session. Unless users are constantly installing large programs the minimum 2 GB cache size is more than enough for everyday use. Clicking this option will bring up a seperate window where this can be adjusted. Should a user max out the cache during any individual session they will simply be prompted to restart the machine in order to free up space. The default cache layout is shown below.

3.) Set Computer Restrictions

Next we are going to dive into the Set Computer Restrictions option. The features that are selected within this menu option are global in nature. They will apply to any non administrative users on the machine without exception.

Most of the features listed in this window are somewhat obscure and only offer advantages in very niche scenarios. Below we will delve into the options that are most important for home users or someone setting up a public machine.

Remove The Administrator User Name From The Welcome Screen – If you will only need administration privileges infrequently, or you’d rather not let others know it’s there, go ahead and enable this feature.

Do Not Store User Names or Passwords Used To Log on to Windows Live – Depending on if this is truly a public or private machine you may want to turn this option on or off accordingly.

Prevent Users From Creating Folders and Files in Drive c:\ - If disk protection is enabled anything on the c: drive gets wiped with every reboot. But if you decided not to go that route, this option can go a long way towards protecting the integrity of your file structure.

Prevent write access to USB storage devices – This is a useful security mechanism in an office environment or anytime you are concerned about user’s swiping large chunks of sensitive data on a thumb drive. This feature roots deep into the OS and requires a restart to activate and deactivate.

4.) Schedule Windows Updates

Your newly protected system might feel invincible, but it’s still important to let the OS keep up with Windows updates. This will keep individual user sessions from becoming compromised and in the case of Vista, will allow for stability and compatibility fixes that might come in handy. To configure how you receive Windows updates select the Schedule Software Updates option from the main menu.

From here you can pick what time the machine will apply automatic updates or if you would like to opt out. Additionally under the Security Program Updates you can select any anti-virus program you currently have installed. In theory this should allow the signature database to update without interference. Microsoft hasn’t compiled an official list of compatible AV suites yet, but unofficially here is what is what users are having success with in the forums.

Computer Associates eTrust

McAfee VirusScan

Windows Defender

Trend Micro

Most of these products have a trial version available which I highly suggest you test out before you shell out any cash. Many problems have been reported getting definitions to survive a reboot, but this only applies to users who enabled hard disk protection in step 2. If you didn’t enable protected mode, anti-virus software will function normally.

5.) Create New User Profiles

Next we will need to create individual user accounts for Steady State to adminstrate. In the steps ahead we will learn how to configure each account to match anyone's needs. Click the Add A New User button circled above to bring up the creation window shown below.

Windows Steady State creates custom user profiles which will appear to the OS as a “limited account”. For those who aren’t familiar with the various permission levels, Windows XP and Vista allow for two levels of user, limited or administrator. Users who log into the system with an administrative account will have access to Windows Steady State’s configuration and even have the option of allowing changes to save to the hard disk when shutting down the computer. Administrative users cannot be created through this interface, and are instead created the old fashioned way through the control panel. Here is a quick break down of the various fields shown above in the add a new user window.

User Name - The name as you would like it to appear on the welcome screen

Password – This can be any length you like or even blank for no password.

Confirm Password – You do remember the password you just typed don’t you? Prove it!

User Location – This allows you to select the disk where the user profile will be stored. Changing this option is important to consider if you are setting up this machine for a typical home user. It will easily allow them to save pictures, documents, and even bookmarks since they are located on a separate partition which will be unaffected by the protected mode enabled in step 2. For a public machine leave the user profile on the default drive which will allow it to be sanitized each time the machine is rebooted.

6.) User Settings / General Tab

The general tab will allow you to configure a few basic features but most of the fields contained in this tab relate more to configuring a public computer. They apply mostly to a machine you might find in a school, library, or even a cyber café. Below is a rundown of the various options that might interest you.

Lock Profile – This is an extremely useful feature, especially if you choose not to protect the disk in step 2. This will prevent any changes to system settings such as the wallpaper or screen resolution from being saved when the user logs out or reboots the machine. This feature doesn’t fully protect the drive or operating system from being modified but should keep casual users out of trouble.

Log Off After – Allows you to set a limit as to how long a computer can be used in any particular session. The user will be notified at login how long they will be given to use the machine.

Always Display The Session Countdown – Annoying but often better than having your users caught off guard by an unannounced logout. This is ideal for short session timers.

Reboot Computer After Log Off – This feature is only useful if you are using the disk protection feature mentioned in step 2. This guarantees that each new login will present the OS as the administrator intended it.

7.) User Settings / Windows Restrictions Tab

This tab is where you really start to break away Windows features that commonly get inexperienced users in trouble. As you can see there are far too many options here to explain individually and most of what you are trying to be accomplish can be done by picking a security preset which can be high, none, or anything in-between. If you are setting up a public computer I would recommend select the high preset and do a quick read through of the list making exceptions as necessary. For home users I would select low or even none particularly if you have disk protection enabled from step 2. Bellow I will point out a few of the most useful options to enable.

Prevent right-click in the Start Menu – This helps keep the appearance of the start menu consistent in non protected drives.

Remove The Control Panel – Disabling the control panel is an important step in securing a system. If they don’t need it, don’t give it to them.

Remove The Run Icon – If you allowed Steady State to protect your hard disk users can’t really cause any permanent damage. But if your disk isn’t protected then the run menu is just another access point that is quite powerful if you know how to use it. It’s best to lock this one down.

General Restrictions – Enabling this feature activates everything below it, and for the most part everything under this tab is a good idea. A few exceptions exist however which I would consider reversing manually. These include Remove CD and DVD burning features, Disable Notepad and WordPad, as well as Disable keyboard shortcuts. For home users disabling these features really detract from the UI and don’t net you a whole lot of security benefits.

Hide Drives – This is useful if the administrator wants to keep files on a separate partition that limited users can’t access. Additionally, since Steady State only protects the windows partition, it will keep users who don’t need persistent local storage from saving anything on the systems hard drives.

8.) User Settings / Feature Restrictions Tab

Feature restrictions will give you complete control over a user’s internet session. This will allow you to set what web pages they are allowed to access and even if they will be able to set bookmarks. If control over the internet is an important consideration, then make sure you effectively locked down a user’s ability to install new software under the Windows Restrictions tab. Since these options pertain specifically to Internet Explorer, if a user can simply download a new browser (even though it might be flushed after each session) your settings won’t accomplish much.

For home users I would recommend low or no restrictions, but only if disk protection is enabled. Bookmarks can be enabled and disabled from here but If permanent storage of your favorites is important, and you are using disk protection, make sure you created the user profile on a separate partition as noted in step 5. This will allow bookmarks to persist between sessions. By enabling Prevent Internet Access (except web sites below) you can keep kids quarantined on the internet, but services such as OpenDNS will make for a more flexible solution to this problem. It also won’t force you to maintain a manual list of kid friendly websites.

9.) User Settings / Block Programs Tab

This tab is where Steady State will allow you to block access to individual programs which are preinstalled on the machine. This list will update as the administrator adds additional programs and using the browse feature at the bottom, can even seek out individual .exe files you wish to block. It’s a great way to limit access to productivity killers such as solitaire, minesweeper, and even hold ‘em if you sprang for Vista Ultimate (The Microsoft equivalent of I Am Rich). Simply highlight the file you wish to block on the left hand side of the window and click the block button to advance it over to the right side. Once you have decided on your list go ahead and click OK which will return you to the main menu.

Conclusion

As you can see Steady State is a powerful tool and when configured properly can do wonders for your limited tech support schedule. As useful as it is, I wouldn't recommend power user’s put this on their primary machine if performance is of paramount concern. Since each file needs to be copied to the cache before it is modified, the OS can sometimes lag ever so slightly, but on modern machines it's hard to notice. Microsoft claims Steady State isn’t a replacement for anti-virus and recommends the two products be used together, but to be honest, AV is a bit redundant. This is especially true if you enabled disk protection. Anti-Virus software will only further bog down the system and has proven to be quite tricky when it comes to configuring it for automatic updates.

Finally I would urge anyone who is setting up a public machine to take a few extra minutes to tighten down the bios. It’s important to password protect the interface and make sure you remove any boot devices before the hard drive. Steady State will protect the machine from even the most sneaky root kitsl, but it can’t stop them from booting from a CD or thumb drive if you don’t tighten down every access point. For additional Steady State references check the links below.

Got any tips you would like to share? Did you find this article useful? Let us know in the comments section below.

Additional Steady State Resources

Windows SteadyState Handbook (PDF)

Windows SteadyState Handbook (XPS)

Windows SteadyState Readme File

Windows SteadyState Technical FAQ

Windows SteadyState Handbook

How To: Repartition Your Hard Drive For Free Without Formatting or Losing Data

Justin Kerr — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 12:00:00 -0500

Partitioning your hard drive has never been easier. Free options, including the Windows install disk, make this once monumental task a fairly simple two-click experience that many of us don’t spend nearly enough time thinking about when we first install our OS’s. It can sometimes be difficult to anticipate your storage needs up front, and many users just assume they are stuck with decisions they made long ago.

A typical user could have many reasons for breaking up a hard drive into multiple volumes, but partitioning your drive after installing an OS is typically a destructive proposition -- one that usually involves backing up your data, formatting, and starting clean. Commercial solutions such as Norton Partition Magic has existed for years and allows you to preserve your data while resizing volumes, but what if you’re working on a limited budget (or completely without one)? That’s where GParted comes into play. This free and open source disk partitioning tool was designed for Linux, but luckily for us Windows users, it comes bundled in a live CD or USB version called Parted Magic which takes care of the Linux requirement.

In this guide we will look at how to use the interface to resize, delete, or create new partitions, all without losing your data or starting over. This will come in handy if you made your Windows partition too large or too small, or if you’re happy with Windows XP, but want to give Vista a spin. Backups are still heavily advised, but with our help, and a bit of luck, you won’t need them. Read on!

What you'll Need:

    * A PC With At Least 1 Disk Drive and 300 Megs Of RAM
    * A Backup of Your Data (Just a Precaution!)
    * 30 Minutes For Each 100 GB of Hard Drive Space Resized (Estimate)

AND

Parted Magic CD ISO

Free, Mirror #1 , Mirror #2, Mirror #3

ISO Burning Software
Free, InfraRecorder

Parted Magic USB

Free, Mirror #1 , Mirror #2, Mirror #3

1. Use Your ISO Burning Software to Create a Bootable CD or USB Thumb Drive

To begin, we must convert our newly acquired iso file to a bootable CD. You can use either your existing CD burning software, or a free alternative such as InfraRecorder. Once this is completed the CD should be moved to the bootable optical drive on your PC. For the USB drive version simply unpack and copy the files over to your USB thumb drive. Make sure you have a backup of your important data and restart your machine.

Having trouble getting your system to boot from the CD/DVD or USB drive? Read below. Otherwise, skip to step 2.

Some computers are not set up to boot from the CD/DVD drive or USB. If your system fails to boot into the Parted Magic options menu (shown below) then there may be a few configuration issues you will need to review. You either need to invoke the boot selection menu (the F-key to access this should be shown at the top or bottom of your screen immediately after power up). A trip to the BIOS will otherwise be required to make a permanent change. Once you enter the BIOS, look for an option called “boot order”. In most cases you use the + or – key to advance the device of your choice up or down the priority list. Upon completion of the boot order change, make your way over to save option and reboot.

2. Boot Into Parted Magic

Select option #1 – Default settings (Runs from RAM / Ejects CD). After selecting this option, you will see the OS copy itself into your system memory and boot into the front end interface. Once it has fully finished booting, the CD tray will eject the disk and is now fully operating from RAM.

3. Use The Built in Partition Imager to Backup Your Files (Optional)

Click the Icon of the wrench and hammer and select Image Partition

The default Partition Imager interface is a bit clunky if you're accustomed to a sleek GUI. If you own an alternative solution such as one of the free suites offered by most hard drive manufacturers, feel free to use that instead. To navigate through the interface, use the arrow keys to select different options and the TAB key to move between fields. This will allow you to create a sector by sector clone of your volumes just in case something goes wrong with the partition. Keep in mind that you’ll want to save the images to a hard drive that you aren’t resizing. A USB hard drive does the trick quite nicely if you have one that's big enough. We prefer this method because we can backup my data and physically unplug the device, thereby removing it from harm’s way.

4. Launch GParted Partition Editor

Down in the lower tray you will find the various operating system functions, the one we are interested in is the GParted Partition Editor (circled in the image above). We now need to take a close look at our partition and what we can and cannot do, as well as what we should and should not do.

5.) How to Use the GParted Interface and Understand Your Drive Configuration

It’s important to understand your limitations when it comes to partitioning an active drive, especially one that contains a bootable OS. We will use examples in the above screenshot to explain these limitations. This screenshot represents an extreme scenario, a drive with 3 preexisting partitions, and two active operating systems. Before we go any further we need to understand what each section means.

1.) Hard Drive Selection - This is the Hard Drive currently selected for partitioning, which in this case is a 150 GB Western Digital Raptor. To Change to a different drive simply use the pull down menu and select the appropriate device (these can even be USB).

2.) Partition #1 - This block represents the first preexisting partition which carries the designation /dev/sda1. By looking at the table below (Item #5) we can see the file system is NTFS, the label is Windows XP, and the used/unused space. The Windows XP label was set by me when the drive was formatted. If you have not assigned these labels you will need to figure out based on the size, what each preexisting partition is. Notice the small grey block beside this partition? Grey blocks represent unpartitioned space, it cannot be used by an OS until it is properly partitioned and formatted into a volume.

3.) Partition #2 - This block represents the middle preexisting partition which carries the designation /dev/sda2. By looking at the table below (Item #5) we can see all features of this block including the label Windows Vista. It is important to note that this partition follows /dev/sda1. The importance of this will be clear by the time we finish this section.

4.) Partition #3 - This final preexisting partition carries the designation /dev/sda3 and represents the trailing sectors on the hard drive.

5.) Partition Information – This is where you will see the details of your partitions, review this information carefully to help you identify what is on each.

Lets look at bit more closely at the different scenarios you may encounter based on the above configuration. If you only have one partition on your hard drive (represented by a solid block), your task is a simple one. You will simply be breaking off a chunk from the end of your main partition and formatting it with a file system. It’s simple, and carries minimal risk. But if you have multiple partitions, with two or more bootable OS’s (such as the above scenario), the recommendations below are targeted at you.

What If I want to resize the first block /dev/sda1? – (Label: Windows XP)

When dealing with bootable partitions we will always want to protect the front sectors when resizing whenever possible. In the above scenario the first two blocks /dev/sda1 and /dev/sda2 represent operating system partitions, Windows XP, and Vista respectively. The third partition /dev/sda3 is a mostly empty swap volume for both operating systems. If I want to add space to the first partition it will need to come from the unallocated grey block directly to the right of it (which in this case is only 5 MB), or from the beginning of /dev/sda2 (Windows Vista). Sectors cannot be taken from /dev/sda3 (OS Shared) because it would not be contiguous.

What If I want to resize the second block /dev/sda2? – (Label = Windows Vista)

Sectors removed from the front of this partition can be added to /dev/sda1 and sectors removed from the back can be added to /dev/sda3. In either scenario, the space could also be use used to form a new partition. If we wish to add space to this partition we will first need to free up sectors from either of the other two volumes.

What if I want to resize the third block /dev/sda3? – (Label = OS Shared)

If we remove sectors from this partition, they can either be added to /dev/sda2 (Windows Vista) or formatted into a new separate partition. They cannot be added to /dev/sda1 since partitions need to be contiguous. If we wanted to add to this partition, the space could only come from /dev/sda2 (Windows Vista).

6. Resize Your Partition

At this point we assume you have studied step 4 and understand the limitations of working with an active drive and can clearly define where you will take the space from, and what you will do with it. To resize your partition simply double click on the appropriate partition and manipulate the various options.

Free Space Preceding – Take sectors from the beginning of the partition which can be attached to any partition directly to the left of it, or formatted into its own volume.

New Size – Space remaining on the partition once all other fields are manipulated. You can enter a number in here if you know exactly how much space you wish to have remaining.

Free Space Following – Take sectors from the end of the partition which can be attached to any partition directly to the right of it, or formatted into it’s own volume.

Create As: - This is only seen if you are creating a new partition using unallocated space. Select Primary Partition if you plan on having fewer than 4 partitions on this particular drive, or if you plan on installing an operating system on it.

Filesystem: - If you’re a Windows user you’ll likely want to choose NTFS. If the drive will be used for Linux instead choose either EX2 or EX3. If you pick the wrong one don’t panic you can always format it with a different file system later on.

Lets assume I want to delete the third partition /dev/sda3 (OS Shared) and add these sectors to /dev/sda2 (Windows Vista). Highlight the partition and click the delete icon at the top. The screen shots below shows the transition.

/dev/sda3 (OS Shared) is now represented as grey unallocated space that can be added to /dev/sda2 or broken into multiple additional partitions. From here I double click the /dev/sda2 partition and increase the size to use up the unallocated space.

/dev/sda2 (Windows Vista) size has now increased from 68.35 GB to 109.74 GB.

Once you are satisfied with the changes click apply (Circled Above) and kick back while GParted moves your data out of harm’s way and resizes the partitions to the new configuration. Note that absolutely nothing happens until you click apply. If you cancel out using the X in the top right, the changes are abandoned and you are back where you started. Additionally, make sure you pay your hydro bill in advance and use a UPS if possible. A power outage during this procedure can cause all sorts of problems that you may, or may not be able to fix without starting over and reinstalling Windows. We hope you took our earlier advice and made a backup!

7. Repair Operating System Partitions That Will Not Boot (Hopefully Optional)

It is very common for Windows to report a problem on boot up after resizing the partition it is installed on. In most cases it will run a check disk and inform you all is well. But what if you OS won’t boot at all? This happens most often when you remove sectors from the front of your bootable partition. Common errors are typically related to boot.ini. The quickest, and easiest way to solve this problem is to pop in your Windows CD and follow the repair this computer option. During my testing, we weren’t able to cause any boot issues that the Windows repair tool couldn’t solve.

How-To: Install Linux Risk Free, With No Formatting or Repartitioning Required

Justin Kerr — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 20:00:00 -0500

Welcome, Digg users! If you're new to our site, you might also be interested in our Ultimate Geek Photo Gallery, featuring 400 Cosplay photos from Comic-Con 2008

Linux, for those who don’t already know, is a free and open source operating system, which you can find in dozens of different versions (known as distributions). The distribution you pick depends very much on your how you plan on using the OS, but for the purpose of this article we are going to assume you are looking for a desktop alternative to Windows. And as a full-featured Windows replacement, no other Linux distribution comes close to Ubuntu, which features a full suite of pre-loaded desktop applications and an easy to use installer. Fresh installs of Ubuntu will contain recent versions of the most popular open source applications including Open Office, Firefox 3, Gimp Image Editor, and several other multimedia tools and games.

The most recent release version of Ubuntu is 8.04.1 LTS (Long Term Support). This distribution is often referred to as “Hardy Heron” and went live in April 2008. It will remain current until the next iteration, billed “Intrepid Ibex”, launches in October. For reference, our previous Ubuntu install guide featured version 7.10, also known as Gusty Gibbon.

Ubuntu contains many unique and innovative qualities designed to make it less intimidating the average Windows user who may be looking for a change. One of these features is called Live CD. Once you have downloaded and burned a copy of the Live CD ISO, you will have the ability to launch a fully functional copy of the Ubuntu to test out driver compatibility and to sample the user interface, all without installing a single file to your PC. This guide will walk you through testing your hardware and installing a dual boot setup all without formatting or repartitioning your hard drive.

What you'll Need:

A PC Running Windows XP or Vista
A Backup of Your Data (Just a Precaution!)
45 Minutes

AND

Ubuntu Live CD ISO
Free, Direct or Bit Torrent
ISO Burning Software
Free, InfraRecorder

1. Use Your ISO Burning Software To Create A Live CD

To begin we must mount our newly acquired ISO file to a bootable CD. You can use either your existing CD burning software, or since we are in an open source frame of mind, a free alternative such as InfraRecorder. Once this is completed the CD should be moved to the bootable optical drive on your PC. We are now ready to restart our machine and begin the trial.

2. Try Ubuntu Without Any Change to Your Computer

As mentioned before, one of Ubuntu’s finest features is the ability to run the OS off the CD before you commit any additional time to an installation. Running the software “live” is made possible without permanent installation by placing all the necessary files into RAM instead of your hard disk. Incompatibilities are rare, but not even Microsoft has the ability to predict every system configuration. The odds are pretty good that if you have problems booting with the “Try Ubuntu” option, you will have problems with a full blown installation as well.

3. Test Your System For Compatibility

If all went well with the Live CD initialization, after a short boot sequence you should find yourself greeted by a fully functional desktop with which to experiment and test your hardware. To get a quick overview of native driver support you can click system, preferences, hardware information. This will give you a list of hardware detected on your PC similar to the Device Manager in Windows.

For a quick and easy way to verify basic compatibility, try using the built in utility located under system, administration, hardware testing. This will walk you step by step through compatibility checks on your video, audio, and input devices. If you manage to pass each stage of the test with without issue, you should have no trouble getting your hardware up and running after a permanent installation. So if you’re now ready to give Ubuntu a home in your system, and have 4GB of disk space to spare on your hard drive, go ahead and restart the computer and boot back into Windows to begin the installation.

4. Install Ubuntu Without Formatting or Repartitioning Your Drives

Your Live CD contains a new feature that can be accessed from the autorun menu in Windows called Wubi (Windows Ubuntu Installer). This interface will allow you to install Linux to any drive on your PC and the option of booting from any OS each time you start your machine. A key advantage here is that since we are installing Ubuntu from within Windows, it can be uninstalled at any time using the Add/Remove Programs utility.

Despite what many people believe, however, this install is not a virtual machine. It works more like a disk image creating a block of data on the drive. This carries a little bit of a performance penalty, but nowhere near what you encounter when you run an OS within an OS. At this point you can simply follow the installer.

Setup Options:

1.) Installation Drive – Which hard disk you wish to install to. If you choose the “C” drive, for example, the image will be located under c:\ubuntu
2.) Installation Size – It is important you pick the size that you think will suit you needs. If you only intend to dabble in the OS, 4 to 8GB should be enough.
3.) Username / Password – Make sure you write this down. Once the OS is installed you will need this to log in.
4.) Click “install”. The amount of time required to complete this step depends very much on the speed of your internet connection, since many of the install files are downloaded on the fly. Upon completion, you will be asked to reboot, after which you’ll be greeted with a new boot loader on startup that’ll give you the option to pick Windows or Ubuntu.

5. Update the OS

Just like a clean install of Windows, one of the first things you will want to do with your fresh copy of Linux is check for updates. This can be accomplished by clicking on System, Administration, Update Manager. Available updates should quickly populate your list. After you have reviewed your options, click Install Updates. If you fail to receive any updates, try launching Firefox by click on the icon along the top to verify a working internet connection. You will want to make sure you are connected to the internet through a wired Ethernet connection since wireless networking may require you to hunt down and download additional wifi hardware drivers first.

6. Driver Configuration

If you only plan to use your copy of Linux for basic applications such as email, web browsing, or Open Office, you may not need to worry about additional drivers. Ubuntu comes bundled with many open source-equivalent drivers. But if you plan on running anything that requires 3D acceleration, rock out to an aftermarket sound card, or even enable most wifi devices, a bit of extra configuration might be required.

If Ubuntu didn’t automatically activate your hardware, it doesn’t necessarily imply that the appropriate drivers don’t exist, rather it might just mean it might not open source. The primary vision of the Linux project is an operating system without restrictions. Some companies such as ATI and Nvidia, however, don’t want to open its drivers because doing so could reveal proprietary information to their competitors. To enable accelerated graphics using proprietary drivers you need to access the menu system and click System, Administration, Hardware Drivers to view a list of your options and activate them manually. You can download the latest versions of these drivers using the links listed below, but until you become more familiar with how to work under the Unix terminal it might be best to stick with the built-in generic drivers.

ATI Linux Display Drivers and FAQ

Nvidia Linux Display Drivers and FAQ

Creative Labs Linux Display Drivers and FAQ

All Other Drivers

7. Alternative Software Options

Because we are dealing with an entirely new operating system, most of your Windows applications will be incompatible (ie. you can’t just pop in an install CD and expect it work). While some of your apps can be made to work under Linux using emulation packages such as Wine and Cross Over, the process could end up being more trouble then it is worth. I’ve listed a few of the recommended open source options below.

Web Browsing

Hardy Heron comes with Firefox 3 built in, but if you prefer an alternative you can also use the newest version of Opera.

Word Processing

If you aren’t satisfied with the preinstalled Open Office you can try installing Microsoft Office using Wine, try something like KOffice , or even just use Google Docs.

Image Editing

The built in GIMP image editor is powerful enough for most users, but if you find yourself needing more manipulation options you could always try Photogenics.

Media Viewers

The built in Movie Player works well for standard media formats, but for extra codec support I suggest trying VLC Player. Additionally, MP3 play back isn’t supported in Linux because it’s actually a proprietary format. If you aren’t prepared to convert your entire music collection to the open source OGG format, some alternatives exist such as Zinf or MJS to play MP3’s natively in Linux.

8. Enjoy Linux!

If you decide Linux isn’t for you, you can always boot back into Windows and navigate over to the Add/Remove Programs Utility to turn back the clock. If you do decide to stick with Ubuntu, you can always try running a dedicated install on another machine or set up a permanent dual-boot the next time you format and repartition your system. To do this, just skip step 4 and double click “install” on the Ubuntu desktop when you boot from your live CD.

Share your Ubuntu experiences in the comments section below!