OK, I got LILO working, then switched over to GRUB. Both of them boot
Linux-Mandrake like a charm, but ... there's always gotta be a but ...
WinDoze stops loading after running its startup script (i.e.
autoexec.bat), and I can't boot from the floppy at all. I can access the
data on the WinDoze disks from Linux, but would really like to boot it
properly when I need to. I know that this is not a DOS forum, but I just
thought I'd mention that all of the DOS init files are still there,
intact.
What I did to get to this point was, using Linux tools exclusively:
1. Shrink hde (extended partition on hd0) using diskdrake
2. Create a small partition (about 200MB) using the newly freed space
3. Make a backup of the contents of /boot, including subdirectories
4. Delete /boot (remember, I backed this up already)
5. Format the new partition as Linux native, ext2 filesystem
6. Give the new partition the mount point /boot
7. Restore the contents of the old /boot to the new /boot
8. Run the "Tools for booting" applet in DrakConf to update the GRUB
files
9. Verify the contents of the GRUB and LILO bootup files
10. Run LILO; reboot; it worked
11. Run GRUB's install.sh; reboot; it worked
With reboots as required during the above process. Diskdrake is kind
enough to tell you when you need to reboot before moving on.
Happy day, until I tried to boot WinDoze, first from GRUB then from the
floppy.
Here's the M$ entries I put in GRUB's menu.lst:
title Windows
boot (hd0,0)
makeactive
chainloader +1
title Floppy
boot (fd0)
makeactive
chainloader +1
WinDoze is on hda1 (yes, I'm sure) which should, if I'm not mistaken,
translate to (hd0,0). And I know for certain that (fd0) is my floppy.
When I try to boot from the floppy, I get a Device Error - it says that
fd0 is a bad device. Mind you, this is with my WinDoze boot floppy; I
haven't tried the Mandrake boot floppy yet, but it worked this morning.
I just mounted my Mandrake boot floppy (fs=ext2) and can see the
contents. Then I did a umount and put in the WinDoze floppy (fs=vfat),
mounted that and can see its contents as well. So, neither the drive nor
the floppies are bad.
I'll be researching this further, just thought I'd let you know where I
am.
Thanks
Jay
Ed Tharp wrote:
>
> hey, as I think about this... the answer may be to point the boot partition
> to where ever / is if you did not create a /boot partition, that should point
> to lilo. then run lilo as an executable before rebooting. I think what the
> question SHOULD be is "where is lilo" not "where is the master boot record".
>
> On Thu, 17 May 2001, you wrote:
> > Hey, that's cool - I thought that the /boot partition had to be the
> > first one on the disk. That also explains the very small "mystery
> > partition" that was lingering on hda when I did the complete fdisk and
> > repartioning.
> >
> > When I say hda is the boot drive, that would be hda1.
> >
> > I've been up for about 20 hours now, so I think I'll wait until the
> > morning before playing with my partitions.
>
> --
> A television may insult your intelligence, but nothing rubs it in like a
> computer
--
There is a fine line between 'hobby' and 'mental illness'.
