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I need some assistance in setting up my computer, just to be on the safe side of things. I know there are many tutorials online about dual/triple booting, but there really isn't anything for my specific cause.

Currently, I have a triple boot set up for Ubuntu, Windows 7, and Windows 8. The partitions I have so far for a 640 gb hard drive is: 17.04gb (recovery for Windows 7 I think), 100 MB system reserved, ~380gb for my C: drive, 7.6 and 32.4 gb partitions for Ubuntu, and a 160 GB for windows 8. Just as a side note, I am confused about what the 100 mb System reserved is, though I feel like its for Windows 7 for booting purposes?

Anyways, can someone review the steps I am planning on taking to get my triple boot working. This time, I want Mountain Lion, Ubuntu 12.04, an Windows 7 on my computer, but I need the windows 7 to be ready to be removed for when the official release of Windows 8 comes out. 1. Clear all of my partitions, while leaving alone the 100 MB System reserved. This will leave me with 2 total partitions.
2. On the bigger partition, install Windows 7 on a newly created 340 gb partition, leaving about 240 gb.
3. Install Ubuntu next using a Boot CD, and put it on a 40 gb partition (which I assume I can create on the Ubuntu installation screen).
4. Just install mountain lion on the remaining partition.

Later on, as i said, I just want to remove the Windows 7 partition and put a Windows 8 partition in its place.

Is there anything I need to be careful of or anything specific I should install?

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This isn't an answer to your question, but if you don't already know, using virtual machines (such as what VMWare offers) is a much easier way of running multiple OSs. I haven't tried booting more than two on one machine, but I imagine you will run into some headaches with three. – jhstuckey Sep 5 '12 at 22:44
@stuckey VMWare tends to slow down the OS's being run in the virtual machine and outside of it. I need full focus on each individual OS. – Sidd Sep 5 '12 at 22:45

1 Answer

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The 100MB System reserved may be what's known as 'swap space' for one of those OSs. Or it may be something else.

There are many ways to do this. One way, and I think the way most people would do it, is to

a) back up your data, then b) re-install the systems themselves in the order of (windows or mac) then Ubunutu since GRUB tends to be nicer to other OSs that are on the same system. Thus, GRUB will be your boot loader.

EDIT: grub will be the bootloader and it will during the install hopefully detect the other two operating systems have give you the option to include them in the master boot record (so that you can boot to them as desired).

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Nice tip about the ubuntu being last! I will try this out and let you know how it is. – Sidd Sep 5 '12 at 22:43
The system reserved is usually made by Windows 7 for various and sundry (primarily Bitlocker); it's not necessary, especially if the bootloader is already elsewhere. – Shinrai Sep 5 '12 at 22:53
System reserved will not be created if there is more than one partition available at the time of install or the partition is pre-formatted. – Moab Sep 5 '12 at 23:10

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