I gave up. A couple of weeks back, I turned my mono-boot Vista laptop into a mono-boot Ubuntu laptop with a screwed-up Vista configuration. I tried everything I could think of, but couldn’t get Vista back… so my laptop is currently on its way to Acer’s support HQ in Plymouth, where its hard disk will be re-flashed to its original Vista factory setup. Here ends another excursion into Linux territory.
Inevitably, my fingers have been burned, and I’m reluctant to try it all again. To be honest, I’ll probably wait until Ubuntu releases its next edition in October, and install it to a (bootable) USB memory stick. I really like the ability to boot into Ubuntu… in some situations, it’s just better than Vista, simple as that. But I can’t risk losing Vista again. I can chuck a USB stick in the laptop bag, giving me the best of both worlds, at a cost of under ยฃ20 from Amazon (for a whopping 4GB).
Oh, and to answer the inevitable question: no, I don’t think Ubuntu is ready for the desktop. Not quite, not yet. But I certainly am not betting against them. Let’s see what October brings.
Responses
Bad luck Simon, these things are never as easy as you think they are going to be. Maybe you should check out the lo-fi librarian for some ubuntu installation goodness?: http://www.lo-fi-librarian.co.uk/?p=664
wubi-installer.org – yes, rings a bell now you mention it. Shame the bell didn’t ring a fortnight ago… ๐
Looks like wubi will be an integral part of the next Ubuntu release, which can only be good news. Partitioning, all too often, is sorrow – and not all that sweet.
When you get your laptop back may I suggest making an image of the drive? This way if you do decide to play again down the road and end up hosing something, you can just restore the clean image without need to send it back to Acer.
Yeah, but backup is for wimps. ๐
I know, I know, I should have done it. But I didn’t have any blank disks handy, and I was getting tired of the constant nagging, etc etc. No excuse though.
All you had to do was delete all partitions and create and format a new partition. I had the same experience and found that linux left a small partition on your hard drive that windows dont really like.