[NTLUG:Discuss] Possible dual boot screw up...

[gandalf.middleearth@verizon.net]

At 7/14/02 6:02:00 PM, you wrote:
>Hi again all,
>
>Ok...the saga goes on.  After recovering Win98 on my wifes computer 
>(fdisking, formating and reinstalling everything), I loaded XOSL as a boot 
>loader and it boots Win98 just fine.  I installed RH 7.3 on what was left 
>of the hard drive (Win98 takes up the first 3.8 Gigs of a 6.5 Gig hard 
>drive), set up the boot loader to load both OS's and Win98 boots just 
>fine.  If I select Linux, it just sits there and does nothing after the 
>boot loader screen goes away.

During the Linux (any flavor) install process, you are asked if you want to load linux from either the MBR, or from another partion. IE... /root if you do not 
have a seperate partition for your /boot. If you are using the MBR, then XOSL will overwrite the LILO boot information, and you will not have boot-up 
information available on any other partition. If you installed LILO to the /dev/hda2   aka the /boot partition, then when XOSL starts, run setup, point it to 
the 2nd partition of the primary drive, and lable it LINUX or whatever you want. But you must have installed LILO to that partition. 

Another remedy (after you have already installed Linux), is to boot from the emergency floppy you made during install, or the recovery boot disk 
provided with most distros. Once Linux is loaded, edit the LILO config (locations vary) file to reflect hda2 as your boot partition, and then re-run 
/sbin/lilo to re-install LILO to the correct partition.

>
>Looking at the RH 7.3 Installation guide, in the section at the back where 
>it covers dual booting, it says that the BIOS in some older systems can't 
>access more than the first 1024 cylinders on a hard drive. If the BIOS 
>provides LBA support, can it access more than the first 1024 
>cylinders?  The hard drive was originally set up as one big C: drive before 
>I started this.  What would I be looking for in the BIOS to see if it can 
>access more than 1024 cylinders?
>

No longer an issue with RedHat.

>Now...for those of you who have used XOSL before, which partition do you 
>select from Linux to boot the system?  Would it not be the /boot 
>partition?  I tried that first, it did nothing, would not boot, but just 
>sat there doing nothing.  I tried selecting root with the same results.
>

As long as that is where you installed LILO. 

>The RH installation guide suggest using fips to resize the Windows and 
>Linux partitions, but since the FAT32 already is being taken up by 2.29 
>Gigs of data, is it going to be possible to resize the windows enough to 
>get to where I can get both OS's to start without just having to start over 
>and reload everything...again?
>
>Here is the information I see about the existing partitions when I check 
>Disk Druid...
>
>/dev/hda
>- /dev/hda1  start- 1  end- 498  size 3906  vfat   format- no
>- /dev/hda2  start- 499 end- 504  size 47  ext 3  format- no   (this is the 
>/boot partition)
>- /dev/hda3  start- 505 end- 734  size 1804  ext 3  format- no
>- /dev/hda4  start- 735 end- 788  size 424  extended
>     - /dev/hda5  start- 735 end- 788  size 424  swap  format- yes
>
>Now...nothing I've seen anywhere explains what the start and end 
>information actually is that's given here.  Are those the cylinders?  The 
>installation guide doesn't say and neither does Disk Druid.  If so, then 
>what am I doing wrong since it appears that everything is within the 1024 
>cylinder (possible) requirement?
>
>sigh...this is driving me nuts.  Any help would ge GREATLY appreciated.
>
>Thanks again,
>
>Wayne
>
>I guess the question I'm having is...since the FAT32 partition takes up the 
>first
>
>
>
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