Ubuntu 12.10, code named as Quantal Quetzal . We reviewed the beta releases of Quantal in our previous posts. Ubuntu 12.10 looks out to be quite promising with a whole new set of features. Here, we present a step by step guide on how to install Ubuntu 12.10 alongside Windows (dual booting). This installation process can also be used to dual boot Ubuntu 12.10 and Windows 8.
Before the Ubuntu 12.10 installation:
- If you have only Windows installed on your machine, you need to empty/shrink one of the drives and create some free space. Free space should be atleast 20 GB (recommended).
Note: The free space is indicated by green colour in the disk management of Windows. - Download the iso file from here.
- Make a bootable USB or CD of the image downloaded and use it for the installation.
- After installing Ubuntu the most common error is Grub missing or Grub rescue. To solve this see Grub rescue commands.
Now we are ready to proceed with the dual boot installation of Ubuntu 12.10 with Windows.
- Boot up with the USB device or CD. After some time, the following screen will appear. Select the “Install Ubuntu” button.
- Then, the screen shown below will appear. As of now, there is no need of downloading the third party software. It can be downloaded later on. Leave that checkbox unchecked and go ahead with the installation by clicking on “Continue”.
Leave the checkbox unchecked and click on “Continue”
- In the next window, you will see multiple options. One can see a short description of what the options do. For example, if you choose “Erase disk and install Ubuntu“, it will wipe out your Windows OS and install only Ubuntu 12.10. We are going for a dual boot. So choose the option of “Something else” and click on “Continue“.
- Doing so, you get the chance of specifying the partitions manually. The partition table will open up. You will see the “free space” field in it and the size which you had freed earlier. (Note:If you had Ubuntu 12.04 or lower versions, simply chose the Ubuntu partitions one by one and delete them by clicking on the ‘-’ button. That would create free space for you to install Ubuntu 12.10. If you wish to keep Ubuntu 12.04 as well, then you need some additional free space which you can get from one of the Windows drive.)
Free space as shown in the partition table. Click on ‘+’ for adding new partitions in the free space
Click on the free space and then click on the ‘+‘ button as shown above. Go on adding the following partitions -
(Important note: The partition sizes used below and in the screenshots were chosen as per the memory available to us. You can choose as per your memory availability)a) 500 MB with mount point as /boot
Boot partition specifications. Click Ok when done.
b) Minimum 8 GB of memory (recommended) with mount point as /
/ partition specifications. Click Ok when done.
c) All the remaining memory to /home
/home partition specifications. Click Ok when done.
Note:
a) Use ext4 as the the file system in all the cases
b) You may add a swap partition if you want. However, as most of the systems come with high RAM’s these days, there is no absolute need of a swap partition.Once you are ready with all the partitions, the partition table will appear as below. Click Install Now.
Partition table after adding partitions. Click on “Install” to proceed.
- Then, you will be asked to select the region. Select the appropriate one.
- In the next window, you will be asked to choose the keyboard layout. Choose the appropriate one.
- Then, in the next window, choose username and password for login and click on Continue.
Fill in the login details. Click on “Continue”
- Your Ubuntu 12.10 installation will finish soon in around 15 to 20 minutes and you will be having Ubuntu 12.10 in dual boot with Windows. Click on the “Restart Now” button after the installation.
- Choose Ubuntu in the Grub menu and login with the details you had provided during installation. Your Ubuntu 12.10 desktop will appear and you are done with the installation.
Ubuntu 12.10 desktop after installation
See also:
In case of any difficulties during installation, please write to us.
When at installation ubuntu, and I about to select where I’ll install ubuntu, there’s no option for freespace. But I just give a space for ubuntu at windows 7 earlier (unallocated) help me
I am stuck at a point where I had shrunk my C drive into two parts and now want to install Ubuntu on the partition I created. But when I click on “Something else” I am taken to a partition table where the drives are all named differently. i have no idea which one is the one I created.
Free space is only a few MBs large. It’s really weird and I’ve been searching forums all day trying to figure out the answer. Please help.
Drive space must be showing in some MB. Divide it by 1024 to convert it into GB. Now, you must remember the entry drive space (eg: SDA1/SDA2…). After this you got to select the very drive and proceed with the installation as mentioned above.