How Do I Install Antix on an Existing Partition?

[Kirkout]

I have an old HP Mini 110 netbook (Atom N270 CPU) with Win XP on it. Alongside XP I installed Peppermint, but it's just too slow on this thing. I tried a live boot to Antix and it works well.

I'd like to keep XP and install Antix. Do I have to erase the Peppermint partition first? I'm not sure how to go about this. The attached pic shows the partitions in the Antix install...

Thanks

 

[osprey]

It appears that the antix installer has not seen that 90.4 gig partition as free for installation. If that's the case, your suggestion to "erase the Peppermint partition", if that's what's occupying the 90.4 gig, would be the next step I would take in order to make that partition "free space". Installers generally in my experience do see free space, or a free partition in this case with nothing in it. Usually I would use fdisk to do that, but one has to be very careful with that tool. If you are unsure about how to do that, please seek further advice. It's best if you know exactly what you are doing before you do it so that the rest of your system is not adversely affected. Please be warned. If, on the other hand you are familiar with fdisk, basically you can delete the relevant partition, and recreate it in exactly the same place using the sector figures fdisk provides. There are many other tools that you can use as well, one popular GUI one being Gparted which you can use from a live disk.

 

[wizardfromoz]

Not poo-pooing what @osprey has said, but I would do otherwise.

Instead of fdisk, you could just as easily use the Windows Disk Management tool introduced with XP and still in use with Windows 11 to reclaim the Peppermint partition.

That being said, GParted is available to the antiX install process, but in particular, a component to the Installer, using the Manual Partition option.

I would use it to install antix to /dev/sda2 over the existing Peppermint install, and the outcome should be that you get a new Grub Menu with antiX on top followed by Windows Boot Manager.

I am guessing that the HP Mini is BIOS not UEFI, but if UEFI you will also need an ESP (EFI System Partition) of 512 MB or so.

I have to leave now for my evening in Australia, but I will be back on deck tomorrow.

Cheers

Chris Turner
wizardfromoz

 

[osprey]

The wizardfromoz proposal does indeed look easier and more economical with usage of the Windows tool. Unfortunately, I am largely MS ignorant so couldn't make such a proposal. In general on new installations, I prepare all the partitions as free space on the disk before I run the installer which I've found invariably is able to see free space. I use command line tools and live disks because I'm most familiar with them for doing the job. I know that new installations can often write over whatever exists on the disk, but situations like the one where this Antix installer seemed to baulk because of the Peppermint installation have also occurred for me which led me long ago to practice that pre-cleaning.

 

[forester]

As @osprey says, " . . . situations like the one where this Antix installer seemed to baulk because of the Peppermint installation have also occurred for me which led me long ago to practice that pre-cleaning."

IME, some distros (especially Slackware et al) appear more sensitive to corruption by the 'dirty' file system known as ntfs and will refuse to install unless at least the partition to be used as / is wiped.

dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sda2 bs=4096 conv=notrunc,sync

This will probably take 15 minutes or more, given the specs of your machine, so wait

cfdisk /dev/sda

create the partition(s) desired in the free3 space where your sda2 once was. Be sure to Write before Quitting

install antiX

 

[Kirkout]

Thanks for the responses. Using GParted during the Antix install, I deleted only the sda2 partition with Peppermint on it. Unfortunately I still got the same warning window as shown in my first post that "A root partition of at least 5.0 Gb is required" After rebooting, I can't get back into XP. I just see this:

 

[Deleted member 137406]

It's been many years since I had to do this so no guarantee.

If you have a Windows XP cd you should be able to boot from it and repair the Windows XP boot loader.

This is what I'd suggest and then after that is restored go into disk management and shrink the disk to the size you want.


Insert the Antix media and boot from that.

When the menu appears where to install Antix just choose next to Windows XP and you should be okay.

 

[Tolkem]

I'd like to keep XP and install Antix. Do I have to erase the Peppermint partition first? I'm not sure how to go about this. The attached pic shows the partitions in the Antix install...

I'm a bit late I guess, but for future reference, most installers can delete partitions, create a new one and install the new system. So, all you needed to do was probably just boot antiX live USB, launch the installer, and when selecting the partition just check format, so it erased its contents and created a new one ready to install antiX on it. I've done this quite a few times, so I know it works. You should try asking on the forum, too:

antiX - MX Linux Forum

 

[Kirkout]

Unfortunately the HP Mini does not have a CD drive. I wish I'd known that all I had to do was format that partition ...oh well.

Thanks for the tip about the MX forum; maybe someone there can help. The AntiX-forum apparently has something wrong with their registration form, so I have been unable to get on there.

 

[ML_113]

I wish I'd known that all I had to do was format that partition ...oh well.

Before clicking on the Installer you can use Gparted (in the Menu) to delete , then make a new ext4 partition ? No ?
You can even do that during the installation process.

 

[Kirkout]

I didn't want to try making a new partition until I had XP back. I finally managed to do that by running the "Recommended repair" option in boot-repair-disk using a flash drive. The PC was initially stuck at XP's loading bar but after a couple of reboots, the OS came up with it's default disk check. After completing that and another reboot, XP returned .

Once I have backup media available, I'll make an image of the Mini's HD. Then I'll try the Antix install again & report back.