Doing things the hard way

I'm not that great with computers and I've been trying to dual boot Linux Mint with Windows 8 (I want to use that for Office for my job and games that aren't compatible with Linux). I was originally running Ubuntu, got tired of the "bloatedness" of the distro and I just like Mint a lot more. However, I hate tutorials. I always think that I know what I'm doing at first and say screw it and just download the tools from the tutorials and wing it. Well apparently, computers don't like it when you wing it without an idea of what you are doing.

I keep screwing up the partitions (because I do read the tutorials afterward to know that I'm screwing it up) and I can't seem to get Windows 8 to load from a live USB for some reason. It just won't acknowledge the ISO file in BIOS (with legacy mode turned off or on). I can install Mint no problem from a live USB but I really want to install windows 8 first as there are some issues with installing windows second as there seems to be no tutorials from dual booting Windows from an already installed Linux Mint install (seems very few people move BACK to Windows after going to Linux). I'm sure there are some instructions out there somewhere (not that Microsoft would ever condone a dual boot of their OS) but I just can't seem to find them.

This really isn't a problem as I have two computers and it doesn't matter if the one stays down for a prolonged periods.....it would be nice if I would get my head out of my @ss and stop learning the hard way though.......but I will probably attempt to do it my way one more time before I break down, wipe the entire hard drive and read a full tutorial. I really despise Windows for their monopoly on computers in the business world.

 

Yeah....so it's not me. I have followed the d*mn guides to the letter and it just won't go. Windows won't install unless I format or clear my entire disk (to include the partitions that Linux is installed on). Unless I do this it says "the selected disk is of the gpt partition style" and nothing online works to fix this (most guides just call to wipe the entire freakiing hard drive....which does work but does not get me where I want to be). So I clear everything and install Windows 8. Then once I have that all set up and working I try to install Linux from Windows but Linux will not recognize/see the partitions I made in windows diskmanager and the only option is the format those god d*mn partitions and be stuck with Linux only. It does not matter if the BIOS is in the Legacy mode or UEFI.

I am on my 3rd go starting from Windows 8....following the third guide (which looks identical to the last one). I'm starting to get a bit irritated with this.

 

Nah, third time was a charm. No idea why, I did the exact same thing I did last time but Linux sees the partitions this time. I guess that saying "Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." doesn't apply to computers.

 

Ugh, spoke too soon, cannot create more than 4 primary partitions (I need 5).....so I'm going to wing it again and try to create extended partitions for Linux.
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Computers are extremely logical. They only do what they have been programmed to do. The programming isn't wrong, my expectations of what the programming should do is.

 

Everything is good to go now. The extended partitions worked out fine for installing Linux (though you can't do this from the installation partition manager, you must make the extended partition and then make your root/home partitions/swap area from gparted then modify them again from the installation partition manager). Just in case anyone attempts to do this don't forget to do a "sudo update-grub" after installation of the second OS. You won't see the option to load Windows in the grub if you don't do this.

Now I just have to update 1GB of updates for Windows....... I am already starting to remember why I deleted Windows.