uninstalling xandros

[mowerman]

This might not be very 'pc' here but my husband needs to uninstall xandros from his laptop without taking off xp professional which is also installed.

We have some problems in that the laptop came loaded with xp Pro so we don't have the discs, to reinstall that, neither do we have a boot disc of any sort (floppy or cd).

I have found info as to deleting the liinux partitions, and I know where to go on the laptop to show them to delete, but how do I then make those partitions available to the xp?

[oz]

Welcome to the forums, mowerman!

I highly recommend the PartedMagic LiveCD for working with partitions. It boots directly from the CD and is easy to use. Once you use it to delete the Linux partitions, it can be used to expand the Windows partitions.

Note that if your laptop is booting from GRUB, you'll need to remove it from the MBR, too, and restore the Windows MBR.

[mowerman]

Welcome to the forums, mowerman!

I highly recommend the PartedMagic LiveCD for working with partitions. It boots directly from the CD and is easy to use. Once you use it to delete the Linux partitions, it can be used to expand the Windows partitions.

Note that if your laptop is booting from GRUB, you'll need to remove it from the MBR, too, and restore the Windows MBR.

thanks for that, just 2 questions - do I just download the Parted Magic Live CD onto the laptop and will it tell me what to do from there? I haven't had too much experience playing round with these areas and I don't want to lose everything! and how do I tell if the laptop is booting from GRUB?

[devils casper]

First of all, download SuperGRUB CD Image and burn it to CD. Boot up from SuperGRUB CD and select 'Fix Windows Boot Loader' option from List. It will remove GRUB and Windows OS will boot up on reboot by default.

Boot up Windows OS and type diskmgmt.msc in RUN dialog box. Disk Management Tool window will pop up. Delete partitions that are marked as Unknown. Create new partitions.

[drjoewebb]

The de-installation on a dual boot computer is detailed in pages 378 and 379 of the Xandros 4 Desktop Home Edition manual. I was quite nervous about it, so I backed all of my work up from both partitions, then followed the instructions very carefully. They actually worked!

The partition, however, remained, and I ended up reinstalling Xandros a few weeks later anyway once I was frustrated by Windows again.

When I checked around online in various places, the only way to re-size the partitions was with a program like Partition Magic.

[mowerman]

thanks for all your help, it looks promising, but as i asked, how can I tell if the laptop is booting from Grub?

And devils caspar when you say "create new partitions" i don't actually know how? Does the Parted Magic 'walk' you thru that process?

[devils casper]

how can I tell if the laptop is booting from Grub?

GRUB is default Boot Loader of Xandros. If computer displays a list of all available OSes at Startup, it means its using GRUB only unless you have installed lilo.

And devils caspar when you say "create new partitions" i don't actually know how? Does the Parted Magic 'walk' you thru that process?

Its very easy to create partitions. Either use PartedMagic LiveCD or Disk Management Tool of Windows.

[oz]

Hope we aren't confusing you too much, mowerman. As you can see, there are lots of ways to do things in Linux.

I like the SuperGRUB and PartedMagic LiveCDs because they are great tools/utilities to keep on hand for working with Linux and/or Windows issues, and both are very easy to use.

Take a look at this HowTo if you need help burning the ISO files to disk as images:

http://www.linuxforums.org/forum/ins...nstall-cd.html

[mowerman]

Hope we aren't confusing you too much, mowerman. As you can see, there are lots of ways to do things in Linux.

I like the SuperGRUB and PartedMagic LiveCDs because they are great tools/utilities to keep on hand for working with Linux and/or Windows issues, and both are very easy to use.

Take a look at this HowTo if you need help burning the ISO files to disk as images:

http://www.linuxforums.org/forum/ins...nstall-cd.html

back again, i have burnt the parted magic live to a cd using the image process as described for the iso file, but I cannot get on to a website with Super Grub on it. Is it possible to comp0leter the process without using this?

[oz]

Some of the mirrors seem to be down at the moment. Try this link:

http://sgd.howto-linux.de/download/b...isk_0.9689.iso