GRUB

[lazyboy]

Dear LNO people,
I have used loadlin or floppy disk everytime to boot Red Hat 6.2 system. I have been surfing and found the grub multiboot loader. I am wondering if it would be able to dual boot my system. My linux system is on the secondary master controller. my / is located beyond 1024 cylinders. My windows is on the primary master controller.
Please shed some light on this matter.

[tnordloh]

Hello, Lazyboy. I too spent about six months booting off a floppy, and I'm actually thinking about going back to it. It makes it so that all you have to do to go into the operating system of choice is to push the appropriate disk in. No more 5 second limit, no more being forced to watch reboots.

Anyway, I don't know much about the program you mentioned, but I don't see why you can't just make your very first partition under 1024 cylinders, therefore causing lilo boot loader to work for you....

[trekker]

Grub should be able to dual boot your system. Else, you can stick with lilo. Get the latest version of lilo that does not have the 1024 cylinder restriction.

Have fun...

[Big_daddy]

Grub rocks. I do have Linux on my first drive outside 1024 and it works fine. You can set your default OS and it will boot after a time limit. This works great for those of us who have spouses and children who insist on seeing the "Help Dog" when they use the computer.

[ 18 April 2001: Message edited by: Big_daddy ]

[bdg1983]

Searching the web for 'grub' will find all sorts of good info on the subject.

[roderyk]

I had problems with LILO, and so I installed GRUB. It works perfectly.

[TC]

Grub is the ultimate in boot loaders:
http://www.linuxgazette.com/issue64/kohli.html
http://www.linuxdoc.org/HOWTO/mini/Multiboot-with-GRUB.html

Hope these help. :)

TC

[lazyboy]

I have a problem trekker. Actually the new version of lilo could possibly boot linux and windows even if linux's / partition is beyond the 1024 cylinder. The problem is that lilo does not (i think) boot from the secondary master controller. Or do you think LILO should be installed in the mbr and not in the /boot partition which is before the 1024 cylinder in my system?

[lazyboy]

Please anyone, shed some light on this matter. Thanks.

[trekker]

Yep, you're right. The newer versions of lilo does not have the problem of /boot being beyond the 1024th cylinder.

I'm not sure how your hardware and partitions are set up. You seem to have 2 hd: One purely for windoze and one purely for linux. Is that right? So lilo should work with being installed on the first partition of /boot.

"lilo not botting from secondary controller" Hmm...I'm not sure about this but I'm guessing that maybe it's your bios? Some bios (I should thinkthe very old versions) are not able to boot from the secondary controller.

Another thought... is your linux on a primary or logical partition?

I'm actually bouncing off some guesses here. Don't know that much... newbie too! :D

Hopefully this post will push this up the list and some guru can help you out.

Or you can try installing lilo in the mbr..

[lazyboy]

<STRONG>
I'm not sure how your hardware and partitions are set up. You seem to have 2 hd: One purely for windoze and one purely for linux. Is that right? So lilo should work with being installed on the first partition of /boot.
</STRONG>
Well you're right one is dedicated to windows on is dedicated to linux.
/dev/hda1 (windows active partition)
/dev/hda2 (extended)
/dev/hda5 (windows logical partition)
/dev/hdc1 /boot (linux active)
/dev/hdc2 (extended)
/dev/hdc5 /usr
/dev/hdc6 /home
/dev/hdc7 /usr/local
/dev/hdc8 /opt
/dev/hdc9 /var
/dev/hdc10 /tmp
/dev/hdc11 swap
/dev/hdc12 swap
/dev/hdc13 swap
/dev/hdc14 /
/dev/hdc15 (windows logical partition)
<STRONG>
Another thought... is your linux on a primary or logical partition?
</STRONG>
/ is in a logical partition while /boot is the first partition( /dev/hdc1). /boot and / are separate partitions.

<STRONG>
I'm actually bouncing off some guesses here. Don't know that much... newbie too! :D
</STRONG>
Well, I'm also a newbie and thanks for helping me.

<STRONG>
Or you can try installing lilo in the mbr..</STRONG>

This procedure is the one I fear most but if i did it and installed in the mbr, everything would be fine, i think. I just fear that I might render my system unbootable.

[trekker]

"This procedure is the one I fear most but if i did it and installed in the mbr, everything would be fine, i think. I just fear that I might render my system unbootable."

Well, if you have a windoze boot disk, you can always boot up with that and type "fdisk /mbr" to recover should lilo fail. Then you can try again by booting up linux with your linux bootdisk and reruning lilo with "/sbin/lilo" at the command line.

[FlightTester]

I concur with trekker. I recently screwed up my mbr with a bad lilo write.

The 'fdisk /mbr' from my windows boot disk saved me from rebuilding the windows side of the house.

[lazyboy]

Thanks trekker for remidning me of the fdisk /mbr command. The windows boot disk is the startup disk right?

[trekker]

yep... that's the one :p

Sorry I am not of much further help :(