Ultra-Thin

[christexaport]

Want to try out the new Windows 10 technical preview on my Acer R7-571, but the fast boot configuration leaves a mishmash of partitions that arent typical of most installations. Since there's no optical drive on this machine, errors arent as forgiving. I know there is no official dual boot support, and as a tech preview, I know my risks. But what I need to know is how best should I proceed in shrinking and creating partitions to allow a dual boot so I can continue to use Windows 8.1 while evaluating 10 at the same time?

My machine is bone stock except for my HD is upgraded to a 1TB model, and I'm updated to Windows 8.1. Any guideance from the partition masters would be awesome.

[IronFly]

I want to be honest, not a big fan of shrinking partitions, since this can broke MBR or GPT on windows 8.1

by the way a good, free and easy tool is "mini tool partition wizard":

http://www.partitionwizard.com/free-partition-manager.html

[christexaport]

Im pretty adept with shrinking partitions and such. I usually use Linux tools like GParted. The issue with messing up the boot sectors is shrinking the proper partitions. Im not familiar with how FASTBOOT works with the SSD, so was wondering if anyone had any experience with installing other OSes on the R7 alongside the original Windows to give insight before I venture into the unknown. Should I just shrink the C: drive partition? Do I format the new space, or leave it? Will shrinking C: affect the MBR?

[IronFly]

i would test Win10 on a virtual machine like VMplayer.

ok, it's not the same thing but, at least, will not create any problem on Win8.1 installation.

shrinking wil affect MBR

if you want to install Win10, you must have a partition without any data inside or some unpartitioned raw space; so if you have only C: as whole disk, you need to shrink it and create a new partition on the remaining space.

also i don't know if WIn10 installation need UEFI boot or legacy (since it's a preview), fast boot is better to be turned OFF.

[christexaport]

I should give a little background. I'm a blogger of mobile technology, and a constant beta tester of anything I can get my hands on. I'm prepared to crash, burn, and drown in the process of testing, but would like to avoid doing so if I can have some guidance. I am wanting to do an actual dual boot install of the Win10 tech preview for the sake of users and readers who have asked that I do so. I am able to install on a VHD, but I want the readers to know what happens when doing it conventionally, along with using this setup day to day, going back and forth, with updates and the whole nine.
My issue is the R7-571 is not set up conventionally like most commercial PCs in that is has this supplemental SSD in addition to the main HD. Im not sure if the MBR is on the SSD or somewhere else. 

I am attaching a picture of my partitions as per the disk management console in Win8.1. What do you think? The system sees that I have one drive, but this shows the SSD and multiple partitions. Sort of confusing, and intimidating, I'll admit. Don't want to mess this up, as I'm currently doing this from a hospital, and don't have all my recovery tools with me, and this machine has no optical drive for recovery if I hose it. But I'm committed to my community to get a solution done as soon as possible.

[IronFly]

You have to shrink the ACER C: partition, this is where your OS is now.

so shrink it and install win10TP on the new empty partition you will create.

if you want to be 100%safe, do a image system before shrinking and an USB media recovery just to have something handy to boot and install the image system.