Installing Linux - partitioning help/question

[hippovsmouse]

Opensuse 13.2 - I created a 6 gb ext3 partition (with my partitioner in windows).

I booted the suse install dvd, intending to install it to the 6gb partition I created.

During the install process, suse is proposing to chop up my hard drive into 3 or 4 partitions (home/swap/whatever else) which would hose my windows installation.
I can't seem to make heads or tails of it, I thought I could just install it to the 6gb partition I made. There are advanced options but they seem labyrinthine, so I just aborted the install.

Any way to get installed without destroying windows? Thank you

 

[lxskllr]

I doubt 6gb is big enough. I haven't fooled with Suse in a long time, so I'm not familiar with its default partitioning, but more partitions aren't necessarily a problem.

 

[Red Squirrel]

Windows is really picky about partitioning. I was never able to get it to work, second you try to resize or do anything with it, it fails to boot after. There's a bunch of other system partitions that it creates now too and they get in the way if you want Linux to be the primary boot loader, as they break if you move them. Easier to just get a separate SSD and have two drives. They're not that expensive anymore and will save your sanity trying to dual boot on same drive. It can be done but just not worth the hassle.

Basically you install Linux as the primary OS/boot drive, and then it will pickup windows and it will be an option when booting.

 

[manly]

I doubt 6gb is big enough. I haven't fooled with Suse in a long time, so I'm not familiar with its default partitioning, but more partitions aren't necessarily a problem.

I don't try a lot of different distros, but installer partitioning is generally a weak area IMO. The CentOS 7 partitioner is very dumbed down for example. Debian/Ubuntu partitioning is fairly good but it won't align to optimal boundaries for SSDs.

To return to the OP, the problem is partly to do with ancient MBR which can have only 4 primary partitions. Nowadays, Windows can have 2 so that inhibits the classical Linux scheme of having 3 primary partitions for boot/root/swap.

I would probably use one primary partition for /boot and then 2 extended partitions for root and swap. Instead of extended partitions, you could instead use LVM. I believe GRUB 2 has no requirement for /boot to be within the first X sectors of a disk like the "olden days."