I recently purchased this system: <https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01G5487WW/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o03_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1>.
I selected that particular system in part because the seller was willing
to install Linux on it for me. Then I got dumb and forgot to request
Linus installation when I ordered it. So I've got a machine with an
unlicensed copy of Windows 7 in a 56 GB partition, and the rest of the
disk in the other partition, which is completely empty.

The unlicensed copy of Windows 7 works well enough for me to download
Unbuntu Linux and prepare a bootable USB installation drive. I intend to
make no further direct use of the Windows 7 system once I've installed
Linux. However, before I actually do so, I wanted to ask for some advice.

1. It's been a long time, but I seem to remember that wine works better
if it has actual files from a real Windows installation to work with.
Should I keep a copy of the unlicensed Windows 7 installation for such purposes? Would it violate any laws for me to do so? In the past I've
used files from licensed Windows installations for that purpose.

2. I've been running Linux on various machines for more than a decade, requiring me to become a de-facto system administrator, but I cannot by
any means claim to be an expert SA (which is why I wanted to buy a
system with Linux pre-installed by an expert). Could anyone give me
advice as to how I should re-partition this hard disk? I plan to use
Wine to run some Windows games I own, most of them dating back to
Windows NT, so it seems to me that it might make sense to set aside a
partition (or 2?) for emulated Windows.
The system will mainly be used for internet surfing, game playing (both
native Linux games and Windows games using Wine), personal bookkeeping
and some computer programming, along with making VPN ssh connections to
my employer's computer systems, where I'll be doing things like using
ENVI to view and analyze satellite image files.

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On Monday, November 7, 2016 at 9:39:49 AM UTC-5, James Kuyper wrote:

I recently purchased this system: [...]
I selected that particular system in part because the seller was willing
to install Linux on it for me. Then I got dumb and forgot to request
Linus installation when I ordered it. So I've got a machine with
[a copy] of Windows 7 in a 56 GB partition, and the rest of the
disk in the other partition, which is completely empty.

The [] copy of Windows 7 works well enough for me to download
Unbuntu Linux and prepare a bootable USB installation drive. I intend to
make no further direct use of the Windows 7 system once I've installed
Linux. However, before I actually do so, I wanted to ask for some advice.

1. It's been a long time, but I seem to remember that wine works better
if it has actual files from a real Windows installation to work with.

IANAL, so I'll pass on the legal part of your question. However, my most recent experience is that Wine actually works better with its own "fresh", native libraries. The conceivable reasons to use an actual Windows partition anyway would be (1) as a
last-ditch effort to try running a program when the original install/backup media is corrupted, or (2) if that's actually not the case for a particular program, or (3) to maintain shared state among users for old programs that relied on an effectively
world-writable file to do so. Even for those cases, a copy of the files (whether on a Linux native filesystem, or on a fresh VFAT or NTFS filesystem, either LVM or in a loop-mounted file) is probably better than getting the mount options right on the
original partition and then maintaining it as your only copy.

2. [...] Could anyone give me
advice as to how I should re-partition this hard disk?

Set up LVM on the remaining space, initial "/", "/home", and "/var" on separate partitions, 5 GB each for "/" and "/var" (you can grow if that proves too small), "/home" as the size of all personal files you intend to copy plus twice the actual disk-
usage on that 56GB Windows partition plus 5GB for initial slack. If you eventually decide you need that 56GB as well, you can add it to the LVM vg.

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