Arch Linux

PythonLinux

Member

Registered: 2021-06-25

Posts: 102

Proper partioning of a hard drive for a Windows 10/Arch dual boot UEFI

Using the Arch Wiki (as opposed to that random dude on the internet's tutorial I linked to in an old since deleted post) I was able to set up my system properly and get the Deepin desktop environment up and running on my Arch VM in virtualbox in a single system configuration (i.e just Arch) with no issues. I'm now practicing installing in a dual-boot. After using Microsoft's tool to get Windows 10 install ISO's I install that, free up some disk space (25GB generally) in the partition manager and boot up from the Arch ISO. When I try to partition the disk to add Arch and try to make 1 swap partition and one root partition it complains about the 5th because I can only have 4 primary partitions and the others have to be extended. So a few questions from a newbie:

1. Why are primary partitions limited to 4?
2. What options should I choose to get a dual-boot configuration? Windows uses 3 primary partitions (I think 1 for UEFI stuff, 1 for recovery and the last for everything else) and I don't think I can convince it to only use 2 so what do I do?

PythonLinux

Member

Registered: 2021-06-25

Posts: 102

Re: Proper partioning of a hard drive for a Windows 10/Arch dual boot UEFI

BTW, the Arch Wiki's virtualbox article is amazing. I was able to get the guest additions running real easy using it.

Scimmia

Fellow

Registered: 2012-09-01

Posts: 13,729

Re: Proper partioning of a hard drive for a Windows 10/Arch dual boot UEFI

msdos partition tables are limited to 4 primary partitions, and have extended partitons. GPT doesn't have any of that. If you're on an msdos disk, the chances that Windows is using UEFI right now are pretty much zero, you're using BIOS.

PythonLinux

Member

Registered: 2021-06-25

Posts: 102

Re: Proper partioning of a hard drive for a Windows 10/Arch dual boot UEFI

Big thank you. That explains so much.

PythonLinux

Member

Registered: 2021-06-25

Posts: 102

Re: Proper partioning of a hard drive for a Windows 10/Arch dual boot UEFI

This time before installing Windows 10 I 1)made sure UEFI mode was enabled in virtualbox and 2) Set it up as GPT using fdisk with an arch live thing without setting up any partitions. Let's see if the windows 10 installer keeps it right.

PythonLinux

Member

Registered: 2021-06-25

Posts: 102

Re: Proper partioning of a hard drive for a Windows 10/Arch dual boot UEFI

I checked and my laptop is Gpt partitioned so I don't have to worry about this nonsense on my real computer. Yay.