Help w/ windows 7, Triple boot w/ SL, W7, Fedora 11

[swmr]

A few days ago I started messing around with my laptop so to speak and decided I wanted to try some other operating systems. In the last few weeks I tried a bunch on virtual machines, but I want to try some full installs.

My laptop is specced in my sig.

Starting with just a 200GB internal Macintosh HD. rEFIt was already installed. Boot Camp refused to resize because of an error.
The steps I took:
1)Back Up with Time Machine
2)Boot from SL disk > Disk Utility > Repartition with 155GB for OS X, 32GB for Windows 7, 10GB free space
3)Restore from Time Machine on first partition.
4)Open Boot Camp Assistant and restart computer to boot from Windows 7 DVD
5)From DVD, format and install Windows 7 on second partition.
6)After installing boot camp drivers normally, both operation systems worked well with no issues and rEFIt work well too.
7)Boot Fedora from live CD and install to free space using Fedora installer to help partition properly and set everything.

At this point OSX worked well, Fedora worked well, but Windows refused to boot. In OS X, the Bootcamp partition still mounts and shows up, and it appears that I can write to it.

Does anyone know what I did wrong?

Or how I can fix it?

At the very least a way to safely wipe that partition so I can use it for a virtual machine for windows.

UPDATE!!!

All three systems appear to boot normally. In Windows 7, any one know why my scrolling is now light speed and my two finger click doesn't work? It was normal yesterday before Fedora was installed.

And why does disk utility say that my OSX partition has 15.86 free space, but finder tells me its 26.34???

 

[swmr]

Now I read one article saying that Windows must be the last partition on the drive. Is that true? Another member here had some setup where that was not the case.

Will installing it last (not second) help solve the problem?

 

[swmr]

Last night I could not get the system to boot from the windows disc, although this morning it did. I tried a repair, and am typing this from Windows (in IE, unfortunately).

Have not yet tried to see if I can still boot OS X or Fedora...but the steps I took are potential possible to set up a triple boot, if not the most succesful.

Any one know why my scrolling is now light speed and my two finger click doesn't work? Was fine yesterday before installing Fedora.

 

[swmr]

All three systems appear to boot normally. OSX is still fastest to startup, but Fedora shuts down fastest. rEFIt runs like a champ, and OSX is still the default after 20 seconds.

I don't know where I went wrong, but all seems well now. . .

On a side note. Does anyone know where the 200mb of free space came on my HDD. (When I partitioned yesterday, I had it all accounted for.)

Any why does disk utility say that my OSX partition has 15.86 free space, but finder tells me its 26.34???

 

[gugucom]

Windows must be on the last of the installed partitions. The Apple GUID partition table installs an invisible 200 MB EFI partition.

 

[swmr]

Windows must be on the last of the installed partitions.

I don't think mine is physically the last partition on the disk. The free space is 200 MB and the last one is my linux install. But you tell me. I'm new to the multi boot option.

 

[gugucom]

This is for sure the strangest partitioning that I have seen so far. Including the two 200 MB partitions you are having 5 partitions there. That is not a recommended approach to tripple boot. Windows tolerates a maximum of four non logical partitions on a disk. Only Bill knows what can happen when you violate that.

Your best approach would be starting with an oversized OS X partition which you will later split to create the Linux. You start with Bootcamp to create your Windows 32 GB partition which will be at the end. When you have installed Windows make a backup with Winclone in case later your partition renumbering fails.

Then you use the GUI feature in disk utility to reduce your OS X partition by 10 GB and crate your Linux partition in that.

Since you are using Seven it will keep track of the partition number change I believe. With XP it would have needed a manual change in the boot.ini. In any case if it fails you can Winclone it back from the image. Winclone will definitely sort the partition number out.

How you set up Linux I can't tell you but take care that you do not damage the Windows bootloader.

If your Windows is working now you can make a winclone image, re organize your partitions and play that back to the last partition.

 

[swmr]

Thanks for your response!

As far as I know I only have four partitions. The "diskox5" or whatever it says there is where Linux is. And all three are booting fine now for two days.

I didn't use bootcamp to partition because at the time it didn't work. A wipe and restore was recommended. So I wiped, partitioned, and restored to the Mac one. Then just popped in windows and installed on the windows one. Linux was later installed on free space.

Would reinstalling everything using your method account for my "lost" 10 GB of hard drive space on Macintosh HD? I have done so twice already and although it is simple, its boring sitting here watching it all happen. So I don't want to mess around too much if I don't have to is what I am getting at.

 

[swmr]

Ok so still no major complaints here but starting today, my mouse drivers in bootcamp seem to be non existent. I used to have double touch right clicking, and now I don't. But when that went away I could still put two fingers on the touch pad and click the button down. Now all right click abilities are gone (as well as the menus...) Anyone know what might be the problem?

Also, any ideas on the missing 10 GB from my hard drive?