[NTLUG:Discuss] Suse / Win2K Dual Boot issue - ntoskrnl.exe missing?

[Terry]

On Tue, 01 Feb 2005 11:07:25 -0600, David Simmons, PE
<dsimmons at powersmiths.com> wrote:
> Guys,
> 
> I'm sure someone's been down this road before - am polling for
> suggestions, etc:
> 
> Setting up a new system - dual boot between win2k and Suse 9.2 - my
> initial plan of partitioning was:
> 
> small /boot area
> Win2k
> Suse 9.2
> 
> fdisked the drive into three areas...when started Win2K install - Win2k
> saw the /boot area as 'C:' (not what I think I wanted) - used the
> '(D)elete Partition' tool within Win2K install and rebooted.  The system
> when saw my 'second' partition as 'C:' - installation/updates/etc went
> smooth.
> 

I'm not sure what your saying in the above paragraph, I think you'd
have to send your partition information for us to understand fully,
but Win2k still has the limitation of only being able to boot from
first partition as far as I know.

> Now onto installing Suse 9.2 - did a ftp install (from the mini-iso).
> (had it format /boot / and swap - it also saw the Win2k NTFS partition
> and auto-mounted it) - GRUB listed both Suse 9.2 and Win2K....Suse 9.2
> starts fine - when I go to start Win2K...black screen with error saying
> it can't find (or is corrupted) ntoskrnl.exe.  I know it's not corrupted
> - but the partitioning must've moved something so that Windows can't
> find it's files.
>

Sounds like somehow you've lost or deleted a critical system file,
"can't find ntoskrn.exe"?, probably a file that was supposed to be in
system32 directory and it's not there anymore, or has been corrupted
some how. That's a MS issue but I think that if you boot the Win2k
install disk again, it has a 'recovery' function that will fix such
things as restoring system files.  I would try that first if I were
you, wouldn't hurt, but I'm not a MS expert so don't know for sure.

> Question:
> 
> 1).  Will a simple  fdisk /mbr 'solve' the issue? - or will it now allow
> Win2K to boot and I'll need to 're-grub' the /boot area?

fdisk /mbr will rewrite the mbr with Win2k boot loader and wipe out
grub but I don't think that'll fix your problem, [again] I think it's
a [Win2k] system file that's missing or corrupt and probably has
little or nothing to do with the MBR.

> 
> 2).  Use console-recovery disk to repair windows so it can find it's
> info?
> 

Yes repair windows, leave everything else alone.

> 3).  start over? (this time doing what different so it doesn't happen
> again).

No, you shouldn't' have to start over, but you'll probably have to do
grub install again, so have SuSe boot disk on hand, or secure some
sort of ability to boot your linux os so that you can re-install it's
boot loader to the MBR because that's probably going to be lost if you
use the Win2k recovery.

> 
> Thanks! - Dave
> 
> NOTE:  Am at work - machine is at home - can get specific logs/fdisk
> layouts/etc as needed, later.
>