How To Install Ubuntu Along With Windows

Last updated November 12, 2020 By Abhishek Prakash 179 Comments

Brief: This detailed guide shows you how to dual boot Ubuntu with Windows legacy BIOS systems. If you are not sure, read this to know if you have BIOS or UEFI system.

Continuing my experimentation with different Linux distribution, I installed Xubuntu last week. Xubuntu is a variant of Ubuntu with Xfce desktop environment instead of the default Unity. Light on resources, Xubuntu can be a good Linux alternative of Windows XP.

I prefer to install Linux in dual boot with Windows. I hardly use Windows but it gives me sort of back up if I mess up with things. Dual booting Linux with Windows is always suggestible for the beginners. In this tutorial, we shall see how to install Ubuntu in dual boot mode with Windows.

This guide covers system with BIOS. You can read this article for dual booting Windows 10 and Ubuntu with UEFI.

Ubuntu, Xubuntu, which one is it? Don’t be confused. The steps given here are equally applicable to Ubuntu, Xubuntu or even Linux Mint.

Before we see how to dual boot Ubuntu with Windows, let me give you some important details.

First, I had Windows 7 installed with 3 partitions on it. Later I installed Linux on it in dual boot mode. I changed the partition and kept around 100 GB of total 320 GB for Linux installation. In the course of time, I upgraded to Windows 8 and subsequently to Windows 8.1. I never had to face the problem of Windows 8′s secure boot thingy. It is just to clarify that this process does not show you how to deal with UEFI .

Install Ubuntu in dual boot with Windows 10 & Windows 8

Follow the steps below to install Ubuntu in dual boot with Windows:

Step 1: Create a live USB or disk

Download and create a live USB or DVD. In Windows, my favorite tool to create a live USB is Universal USB Installer.

Step 2: Boot in to live USB

Plug the live USB or disk in to the computer and restart the computer. While booting the computer press F10 or F12 function key (defers from computer to computer) to go to the boot menu. Now, choose the option to boot from USB or Removable Media.

Step 3: Start the installation

It will take some time to boot in to the live USB or disk. Once booted, you will be immediately provided with option to either try Ubuntu or install Ubuntu. Even if you choose to try, you can find the option to install on the desktop:

First few screens are pretty straight forward. Just choose press continue:

Step 4: Prepare the partition

This is the most important part of the whole dual boot installation. Where to install Ubuntu? Windows is already installed here, so, we’ll prepare a new partition for Ubuntu. In the Installation Type window, choose Something Else:

As you can see, I have 3 NTFS and some ext4 partitions. If you don’t have ext4 partition, don’t worry, we don’t need that. As you can see in the picture below, one of the NTFS partition consists of Windows installation. This should be untouched if you want to keep your Windows installation safe.

I presume that you have more than one NTFS (or FAT 32) partitions (i.e. Drives in Windows term) on your hard disk, with one of them consisting of Windows installation (usually C drive). What you need to do here is to delete a NTFS or existing ext4 partition and create some free space. This will delete all the data in that partition and this is why I asked you to verify if you have Windows installed in a different partition.

Click on the desired partition and press the – to delete the partition.

Step 5: Create root, swap and home

Once you have some free space on your hard drive, its time to install Ubuntu on it. Now, there are several ways to do it. But I prefer to have a Root, a Swap and a Home.

The root should be at least 15 GB for a comfortable use. If you have more disk space, increase the root size. Suppose you have 100 GB of disk space. You can easily devote 30 GB of space to root.

Create a root partition first. Choose the free space available and click on +.

Here, choose the size of root directory (keep it 20 GB or more), choose ext4file system, and mount point as / (i.e. root):

Next step is to create swap partition. It is advised by many that Swap should be double of your system’s RAM size. You can choose the swap size accordingly.

The next step is to create Home. Try to allocate the maximum size to Home because this is where you’ll be downloading and keeping the files.

Once you have created Root, Swap and Home partitions, click on Install Now button.

Step 6: Follow the trivial instructions

If you successfully created the partitions as mentioned above, you have almost won the battle. Rest is just some trivial steps to follow. You will be taken through a number of screens to select options like keyboard layout, login credentials etc. You don’t have to be a genius to figure out what to do here afterwards. I have attached screenshots for reference purpose here.

Once the installation is over, you will be presented with the option to keep trying live version or to restart the system.

And that’s it. On next boot, you will see the option of Ubuntu in the grub screen. And thus you can enjoy the beautiful, beginner friendly and world’s most popular Linux distribution. I hope you found this guide to dual boot Ubuntu with Windows helpful. If you need, you can change the boot order easily to make Windows your default OS. Since you have just installed Ubuntu 14.04, you can check out things to do after installing Ubuntu.

If you have questions, suggestions or a word of thanks, feel free to drop a comment.

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How to Install Ubuntu on Windows 10 using Hyper-V?

Windows have come a long way.

Great news – now you can install Linux on Windows desktop or laptop. Isn’t it exciting news?

Thanks to Microsoft! If you are using Windows 10 and would like to have Linux installed,, then the following steps may help. I assume you know about Linux. If not, then check out this beginner video.

As you may know, Linux got multiple distros, and one of the popular among is Ubuntu.

We will be discussing how to get that installed.

What is Hyper-V?

Microsoft’s Hyper-V is not new. It got first released in 2016. At the time of release, it is thought to be a big competitor to other virtualization technologies, including Oracle’s VM VirtualBox or VMWare’s Fusion.

Hyper-V is a virtualization solution that lets you do virtualization from Windows. Just like other virtualization solutions, it also can virtualize not only hardware but also the entire operating systems. That’s why it makes it an ideal choice for Linux virtualization on Windows.

It comes in three versions.

• Hyper-V server
• Hyper-V Windows Server
• Hyper-V on Windows 10

If you are using the latest Windows 10, version 1903, you should have Hyper-V pre-installed.

Enabling Virtualization

Before we start, you need to make sure your machine supports virtualization. Almost all the latest AMD and Intel CPUs support virtualization.

The below requirement is needed to get started with Hyper-V

• A 64-bit CPU with SLAT support. SLAT stands for Second Level Address Translation
• Support for virtualization in the form of VM Monitor Mode Extension. It is VT-c on intel chips and SVM mode on AMD Ryzen chips
• Lastly, you need a minimum of 4 GB of RAM

But Hyper-V might fail to start because of disabled virtualization in BIOS.

To enable the virtualization of your setup, you need to change it from the motherboard bios itself. I am running AMD Ryzen 1600 with Gigabyte AB350. For this, I needed to go to the bios setting, and then to CPU advanced features and from there change SVM mode from “disabled” to “enabled.”

In my case, it worked as intended. But you might also need to enable Hardware Enforced Data Execution Prevention in BIOS.

The below video helped me to figure out how to enable virtualization on my setup.

You can also look out for videos on how to enable virtualization. Otherwise, I recommend going through the motherboard manual.

To verify if your machine meets the Hyper-V requirements, you need to run systeminfo.exe in the command prompt. To do so, follow the steps below:

• Open Start
• Find Command Prompt
• Type the command – systeminfo.exe
• Press Enter

You will get a lot of information output. There you need to check out the Hyper-V requirements. If everything is enabled correctly, it will say Yes on four fields, as shown in the image below.

All Yes? Let’s move on…

Enabling Hyper-V

Now that we have enabled virtualization from BIOS, it is now time to enable Hyper-V. By default, it is disabled.

To enable it, follow the steps as below:

• Go to Control Panel
• There search for Programs and click on it
• Click Turn Windows features on or off

• Scroll down and select Hyper-V and also the other two options: Hyper-V Management Tools and Hyper-V Platform.

• Click on OK to finalize the process.

It will ask you to restart the system. As most of the time – nothing works on Windows without restarting. Please restart.

Creating a Virtual Switch

Once, above all, is done, it is now time to create a virtual machine. To get started, we need to create a virtual switch.

To do so, check the following steps.

• Turn on Hyper-V Manager from the start menu
• Now right-click on your system name and then click on the “Virtual Switch Manager.”

• Click on the “New Virtual Network Switch” on the left section and then “External” in the right section.

• Finally, click on “Create Virtual Switch.”

You will now be asked to enter a name for the switch. You can put anything for your reference. Under the name section, there will be a section called “connection.” There you need to select the external network connection that you have.

• Click Apply and then OK.

Installing Ubuntu

There are two ways to install. The easiest way is to take the help of the inbuilt wizard named “Quick Create.” It is listed under the Action menu. Another option is to manually create the virtual machine through a step by step process.

Let’s explore both options.

But, before that – download the Ubuntu from their official site.

Installing Manually

• Click Action → New → Virtual Machine.
• A new wizard will pop up that will tell you before you begin page – click Next.

• Specify the name of your virtual machine along with the location where you want to store it. By default, it stores in your C:\ drive or the drive where your Windows 10 is currently installed. Let’s name our virtual machine as “Ubuntu 19.04″
• Next, you need to choose the virtual machine generation. There are two options, including Generation 1 and Generation 2. Select Generation 2 only if you have UEFI-based firmware. This is an important step as you cannot change the type of virtual machine you are trying to install.

• Select the memory you want to allocate. I recommend using 2 GB of memory. If you are low on memory, even 1 GB of memory is enough. Also, ensure you turn on dynamic memory for the virtual machine.
• In the configure networking section, select the network interface you created earlier.
• Connect to a virtual hard disk. In layman terms, it means that you need to select the location where your virtual hard disk will be stored. Here, you also need to set the size of the virtual machine. For Ubuntu or majority of the Linux OS distros, 25 GB is minimum.

• Choose the “Install an operating system from a bootable CD/DVD-Rom.”
• Then click on “Image File” and select the image file that you downloaded earlier.
• Click on Next
• You will now see the final summary of your choices. Review them and click on “Finish.”

• Right-click on your new virtual machine and then click “Connect.”

This will start the virtual machine. Follow the screen instruction to complete the installation.

Installing using the Quick Create option

Let’s first see the steps required while using the Quick Create option.

• Click on “Quick Create”
• A new window will pop up where you will be asked to select the operating system. It lets you choose from four operating systems, including MSIX Packaging Tool Environment, Ubuntu 18.04.3 LTS, Ubuntu 19.04, and Windows 10 dev environment.
• You can select Ubuntu 18.04.3 LTS or Ubuntu 19.04 and click on “Create Virtual Machine.”

It will then download the image of the Ubuntu version you selected. A download may take some time, depending upon Internet speed. Once done, follow on-screen wizard instruction, and you are ready to use Ubuntu.

Conclusion

I hope this gives you an idea about installing Ubuntu on Windows.