Switch Back From Mint To Windows?

Hello All. This is my first post here. I am worse than a newbie; I'm a PC dinosaur! Not joking either.
Recently got a Dell Inspiron 3048 with Windows 8.1 pre installed. As I am a die hard XP user (my other PC is a Dell Dimension 2400), and seeing that PC's days may be numbered, I want to start using Linux, and decided Mint 17.1 would be first on the list.
Ordered a Linux Mint 17.1 boot disk and went to install it. At the option for a dual boot with Windows, I got lost, and did not understand the "other" choice versus making Linux the only OS on the PC. I wound up wiping my HDD and lost contact with Windows 8.1. Fortunately, the Dell Tech I got at Dell Support was able to walk me through getting Windows back up, but the only way I can now access Mint 17.1 is with the boot disk, but there is no set up options as it is already set up, even though incorrectly for a dual boot.
How do I wipe out Linux without losing Windows 8.1 as well so I can re install Linux and this time make the correct selection for a dual boot?
Anyone willing to respond please do so small and slow so I can follow.
TIA.
BTW, I have tried installing Zorin OS 9 Ultimate on my XP machine via DVD and USB, but I can't get past the f1/f2 loop, even though I have reconfigured my boot sequence according to the drive I'm installing from. Zorin support has been MIA on this. Anyone having a similar problem?
Cheers

hi All,

i tried to make a bootable linux mint usb. i thought i succeeded but when i pull out the usb and try to boot back into windows i still boot into linux mint. this is probably a stupid question but have installed linux mint over my windows mistakenly.

help....please

Hi,

Before installing Linux Mint 17 to the entire HDD of my HP p2 1317cb desktop, it was running a preinstalled windows 8 OEM UEFI. After several failed attempts of dual booting(no grub menu and boots directly to the windows 8) i then decided to do a erase all and install Linux option. Now i have Linux Mint 17.1 working flawlessly, so far. What i want to now do is, dual boot a windows 7 installation alongside my Linux. Please advise on the best way to do this.
Thank You.

Note: Before doing a clean install of Linux i disabled secure boot,enabled legacy, and disabled fast boot.

Hello everyone,
Recently, I installed Linux Mint 17 (Cinnamon) on my HP dv6 Laptop. During installation Linux was not detecting my original Windows 7 and was attempting to occupy the entire hard disk. So I used the "Something Else" option to manually create separate partitions for Linux (Previously I had allocated around 120 GB free space for Linux using Windows Disk Management). This installed the Linux but after booting it does not detect Windows 7 and directly boots to Mint. I have tried installing and updating the grub but it did not help either.
Please Help...

Hi friends. I have to say right off the bat, this is basically my first time trying to install Linux by myself. After reading this forum and others, and tech sites, I decided Linux Mint looked the most to what I am used to, which is Windows 7.


Here is my CPU-ID Info - http://valid.x86.fr/5ya0sx


I downloaded Linux Mint 17.1 Cinnamon 64bit (The one found on this link, http://www.linuxmint.com/edition.php?id=172).
I burned the img to a DVD with Nero Burning ROM. I wanted to boot from the disc, and the Linux started to show it's logo, and I waited for a few minutes, and I finally thought something was going to happened, but this showed up, (Screenshot) http://i.imgur.com/oELzKCg.jpg.
So basically I shut down my computer and here I am. I have eno experience as to what I am supposed to do when I get that message. Frankly I did not see this type of message when looking through step by step instructions about how to install Mint allongside W7.
Can someone please tell me, for the love of Star Trek Voyager and all that is Holy, how do I install Linux Mint 17.1 Cinnamon as a dual boot on a Windows7 system.

Thank You

I just got a new laptop with Windows 8.1 and I cannot figure out how to install Linux Mint by booting from a CD or USB drive. Previously, I had installed Linux Mint on my old desktop and netbook computers that were running Windows XP. I had no trouble booting from a CD. Now that the process has been complicated in Windows 8.1 I don't know what to do. Any help would be greatly appreciated, I would really like to get rid of Windows 8.1 ASAP. Thanks!

Did it again!

Last week, with help from this forum, I was able to install Linux Mint 17.1 dual boot with Windows 8.1. It worked so well, I decided to explore other Linux distros recommended by forum members as some I wanted to check out.

I was using Unetbootin to download and install these as live sessions on my Windows 8.1 partition.

On my last such download, something went wrong, and no doubt I caused the error, but no clue as to how.

When I opened up this PC, I got the normal dual boot option for Windows and Mint. When I selected Windows, I found an additional dual boot option between it and Unetbootin! Somehow I created a partition (?) on my C Drive for Unetbootin (see Thumbnail below).
This Unetbootin option only goes to a page for me to choose another OS. Further, when I rebooted, the Windows/Mint dual boot option no longer existed, just the Windows/Unetbootin one.

Been checking out various articles and websites about BCD/MBR repair, but nothing definitive (that I can understand) about modifying these to delete the Unetbootin partition and restoring the Windows/linux dual boot.

Naturally, this is a newbie land mine area, so I'm very reluctant to try anything I can't fully understand, which is the category everything I've Googled on this topic falls into.

Anyone know how I can resolve this short of a complete start over
installation based on steps that basically a PC fence post can follow?

TIA
Cheers!

Right now I have Linux Mint and Windows 7 set up as a dual boot. I'd like to replace the Windows partition with ChaletOS. I never use Windows and have no reason to keep it. Also I don't want to back up any files on the Windows.

How do I go about this (safely)?

Hi, So im quite new to linux and im not surprised as iv tried before to check it out and failed then (old computers problem) but i decided to have another go on a new comp recently.

UEFI mobo
Nvidia geforce 770 as output.

I need a duel boot of win7 & mint. Win7 is installed.

UEFI has caused me so many problems its just beyond me ! (i had never heard of it before i brought this comp)

booting Mint from a cd/dvd works fine.

booting from a USB fails with a blank or locked up screen at the first mint logo. (many tests with dif methods of creating live USB)

Installing mint with grub over the top of win boot loader fails , i get no options to choose between win & linux it boots straight to linux and then fails (same error as above)

I have a small SSD with win7 , there is not a lot of space on it so i want to install mint 17.1KDE on a different HDD.

After a month or so of reading testing reading testing etc i ended up getting mint installed on partitions i created on secondary HDD but i had to keep the windows boot loader in place and use easyBCD.

However now i get the choice of win7 or linux and windows still actually works (breakthrough ^^) BUT linux just crashes at boot (at the first logo) and then the monitor looses all signal?


I am soo frustrated. Mint will run of a CD but i can not get it to work in any other way , please help

Thx.

Since I have not found a solution to my intermittent boot problem I'm thinking of reinstalling Linux Mint, switching to a different Linux distribution, or turning back to the dark side, i.e. Windows. This was my first Linux install and I was really impressed with the OS and the applications. I like Linux Mint but I want a reliable computer and if I cannot even get it to boot properly then that's a long-term concern.

The problem with a reinstall of Linux Mint is that I don't know what to do differently. I don't know what, if anything, I did wrong the first time. Of course, switching to a different distribution is also a crap shoot since I don't know what went wrong with Mint. I don't really want to go back to Windows but it's been a stable, reliable OS for me for years.

Anyone have any advice?