I was looking at installing some Linux OS on my laptop permanently and Win7 as a secondary option. Can I format the HDD then install Linux? Or do I need to do it while there is a current os?
Also any risks?
INSTALL WINDOWS FIRST!!!
As mentioned earlier windows does not see Linux so it will not add a boot-loader with Linux. Linux on the other hand will install windows into it's boot-loader. You can fix it if you do Linux first but it's best to save the pain.
You haven't mentioned which Linux but most of them will give you an option to install side by side with windows. If there is a large empty space it'll use that or if you installed windows to the entire drive then it will shrink the windows partition about in half and then install. Bottom line is it does it all for you.
Your laptop may have several partitions including a hidden recovery partition
If you have windows already on the laptop you need a partition for Linux
If you can only see one partition which is c: you may need to shrink the partition to make space for the Linux partition
Many Linux live DVD have Gparted partition manager which can do this provided there is enough free space on drive
Due to data loss risk back up any important data before changing partition structure
You leave Linux to format the partition it lives in
Modern Linux can see windows NTFS format partitions
Windows can't see Linux formatted disks without a driver
Some free , some free for read only but paid for read write
As long as you've backed up your personal files & have all of your install disks/apps saved somewhere else, then yes, the proper procedure is to first format the disk then install the OS.
Okay, I don't care about the things on the laptop, everything is on the desktop already. There are no partitions on the laptop hard drive, but I'm thinking I should create one to install Linux and the other for the windows.
Windows will offer to use whole hard disk when you install it .
you take advanced option to use part of hard drive and create partition
Windows setup automatically formats partition and sets up windows
When you boot up Linux install disk ( cd , DVD or usb) and start installation it also creates partitions and formats them , be careful you tell Linux to use free space on hard drive and not over write windows partition
INSTALL WINDOWS FIRST!!!
As mentioned earlier windows does not see Linux so it will not add a boot-loader with Linux. Linux on the other hand will install windows into it's boot-loader. You can fix it if you do Linux first but it's best to save the pain.
You haven't mentioned which Linux but most of them will give you an option to install side by side with windows. If there is a large empty space it'll use that or if you installed windows to the entire drive then it will shrink the windows partition about in half and then install. Bottom line is it does it all for you.