GPT partition table problem: Windows 7 and Ubuntu dual boot

Question

I hope you guys will help me get through this situation I have gotten myself into.

I bought a new samsung ultra book running windows 8. I knew going into the purchase that I wanted to ditch windows 8 and install Ubuntu and Windows 7 due to using this pc to build android and android apps.

I used gparted and deleted the partitions and installed Ubuntu on a separate partition without much grief. But now I can't get windows 7 installed on the other. I get a strange msg about GPT partition system or something.

From my understanding that is due to a new bios system and safe boot. I disabled safe boot but still can't get the install. If someone wise could assist me I would be very happy.

A second option would be to run a virtual machine and operate windows 7 that way but I'm having issues with that as well. I get a driver issue that tells me to SU /etc/init.d/vboxdrv update. But that gives a command doesn't exist.

Thanks in advance!

Solution

The windows 7 installer does not install to EFI/GPT as default.

You need to put your Win7 installer disk's files onto a FAT32 formatted USB thumbdrive and copy an EFI bootloader into a specific location in order to get it to boot into the EFI-mode installer.

Follow this link:

http://community.spiceworks.com/how_to/show/1840-installing-windows-from-usb-stick-to-a-gpt-drive

Also; this might help:

How do I create a multiboot environment using LVM for your *buntu operating systems on a GPT formatted system drive, in a UEFI based system?

Comments

[fabricator4]

This is really a Windows question. You'd probably get better help on a Windows support site. A couple of observations though: Only 64 bit Windows 7 can boot from a GPT: msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/hardware/gg463525.a‌​spx and observation 2 is that installing Windows after Ubuntu will remove grub and the ability to boot Ubuntu until you re-install grub and configure it correctly.

[Sushiant]

I agree. I think windows 7 does not support GPT without EFI. I have tried and couldn't.