I find mixed advice on the Linux partitions and where to put them (SSD or HDD). Some recommend only having /, /swap and /home, while others suggest splitting further /usr and /usr/local (I don't plan on splitting /var as this won't be a server but a development workstation). Others even suggest putting /home on the HDD instead but some recommend leaving /home on the SSD but creating symlinks in /home to partitions/folders on the HDD for the media/data for example.

I've seen some suggest a /boot partition but I don't intend to use other flavors of Linux so I'm not sure I need this.

I will at least have a few partitions on the HDD for media/documents/other (NTFS to share with Windows) and some spare space to install a rescue os in case of disaster.

4) Do I need a /swap partition and should I leave it on the SSD or shift it to the HDD? Or have 2, one on the SSD and one on the HDD but possibly setup so that the HDD /swap is used first and the SSD one is only used as fallback in case the HDD is not there?

The /tmp partition will be a RAM disk on Linux (same ramdisk on Windows to map temp and other temporary locations) - shutting down will clear anything in memory.

Finally, I have found all the other posts about optimizations in each OS for SSDs so we don't need to cover this here.

I find mixed advice on the Linux partitions and where to put them (SSD or HDD). Some recommend only having /, swap and /home, while others suggest splitting further /usr and /usr/local (I don't plan on splitting /var as this won't be a server but a development workstation). Others even suggest putting /home on the HDD instead but some recommend leaving /home on the SSD but creating symlinks in /home to partitions/folders on the HDD for the media/data for example.

I've seen some suggest a /boot partition, but I don't intend to use other flavors of Linux so I'm not sure I need this.

I will at least have a few partitions on the HDD for media/documents/other (NTFS to share with Windows) and some spare space to install a rescue OS in case of disaster.

4) Do I need a /swap partition and should I leave it on the SSD or shift it to the HDD? Or have 2, one on the SSD and one on the HDD but possibly setup so that the HDD swap is used first and the SSD one is only used as fallback in case the HDD is not there?

The /tmp partition will be a RAM disk on Linux (same ramdisk on Windows to map temp and other temporary locations) - shutting down will clear anything in memory.

Finally, I have found all the other posts about optimizations in each OS for SSDs, so we don't need to cover this here.

I'm about to build myself a new machine (To replace my old Celeron, yes you can laugh :P) and I want to be able to dual boot on Windows 7 (mostly for games) and Linux (development/programing). I'm a complete newbie in Linux installations but have used Unix/Linux in the past but never installed it myself on my own machine. I also want to document this thread as I couldn't find any solution on super-user to this problem and data seems to be scattered everywhere and I'd like to assemble it in one post with all the answers I've found a few posts online and here on super user but none addressed the dual boot on separate SDD + data HDD problem I'm facing.

I've found all the guides and warnings about partition alignment and I think I got that covered correctly on how to calculate the sizes, offsets and offset of the first partition.

Important Notes:

I've seen some solutions on dual booting from separate disks that say boot from the Linux drive first and add a menu item in GRUB to boot Windows from that disk. And others saying edit the Windows boot loader to add a Linux entry? I thin I prefer the first option since it doesn't mess with Windows which seems prone to messing up in updates and what not.

I will at least have a few partitions on the HDD for media/documents/other (ntfs to share with windows) and some spare space to install a rescue os in case of disaster.

The /tmp partition will be a RAM disk on Linux (same ramdisk on windows to map temp and other temporary locations) - shutting down will clear anything in memory.

Finally, I have found all the other posts about optimizations in each OS for SSDs so we don't need to cover this here.

Thanks in advance for the help.

I'm about to build myself a new machine (to replace my old Celeron, yes you can laugh :P) and I want to be able to dual boot on Windows 7 (mostly for games) and Linux (development/programing). I'm a complete newbie in Linux installations - I have used Unix/Linux in the past but never installed it myself on my own machine.

I've found all the guides and warnings about partition alignment and think I have that covered correctly on how to calculate the sizes, offsets and offset of the first partition.

Important notes:

I've seen some solutions on dual booting from separate disks that say boot from the Linux drive first and add a menu item in GRUB to boot Windows from that disk. And others saying edit the Windows boot loader to add a Linux entry? I think I prefer the first option since it doesn't mess with Windows which seems prone to messing up in updates and what not.

I will at least have a few partitions on the HDD for media/documents/other (NTFS to share with Windows) and some spare space to install a rescue os in case of disaster.

The /tmp partition will be a RAM disk on Linux (same ramdisk on Windows to map temp and other temporary locations) - shutting down will clear anything in memory.

Finally, I have found all the other posts about optimizations in each OS for SSDs so we don't need to cover this here.