Manually partition your hard drive
1 Boot to Ubuntu live desktop
Either boot from your Ubuntu installation media and choose ‘Try Ubuntu’ when prompted or, if you’re at the ‘Installation type’ menu during an Ubuntu installation, click Quit twice. Either way you’ll be taken to the Ubuntu live desktop. Click the icon at the top of the Launcher on the left to open the Dash. Type ‘gparted’ to bring up ‘GParted Partition Editor’, then click it to launch the tool.
2 Select target drive
We’re using GParted to free up space on your hard drive for Ubuntu. By default, /dev/sda should be selected in the GParted window – this is the drive Windows is installed on. Use its size and the partition list beneath to verify it’s the drive you want. If you plan to install Ubuntu to another drive, click /dev/sda to view other drives, using their size and partition structure to identify the one you’re after.
3 Prepare dedicated drive
If you’re installing Ubuntu on to its own dedicated drive then it should show up empty (or ‘unallocated’) if you’ve purchased it new and not yet initialised it. If you’re repurposing an old drive, existing partitions are likely to be visible. Confirm it’s the correct drive and that you don’t need any data from it, then right-click any partitions that are visible and click Delete to remove them. Once done, jump to step five.
4 Free up space for Ubuntu
If you’re installing Ubuntu to your Windows drive, see the partition layout. If there’s one large partition, right-click it and choose Resize/ Move; for multiple large partitions, right-click the one on the far right to resize that if it’s large enough. Click and drag the right-hand slider to the left to free up enough space for Ubuntu, leaving at least 10GB free space for the existing partition. Click the Resize/Move button.
5 Apply changes and install Ubuntu
Click the green tick button. If you’re happy, click Apply and wait for the partitioning to complete. When done, click Close, then exit GParted and double-click ‘Install Ubuntu 17.04’. Follow the install wizard as outlined in the main text to the ‘Installation type’ page, then choose ‘Something else’ to manually choose where to install Ubuntu. Click Continue.
6 Set up Linux partition
Select the free space for installing Ubuntu (under /dev/sda, say) and click +. Leave the size but make the new partition ‘Logical’. Verify it’s set at the ‘beginning of this space’ and the ‘Use as’ menu points to ‘Ext4 journaling file system’. Click the ‘Mount point’ menu and choose /, then click OK. Verify the drive Windows is on is selected for ‘Device for boot loader installation’, then click ‘Install Now’.