Dual boot and GRUB... help ...

[boykov]

hi there

i´ve been trying to install linux on my PC for a while .. i´ve tried Red Hat, knoppix, SUSE 9.2, Fedora core 3 and core 4 ... not that they dont get installed BUT cannot make the system dualboot.... and because i can not get the internet configured properly , I end up deleting linux ..
Since this year i still haven´t tried any linux yet ... i decided to have another go.... downloaded Fedora Core 5 (since its quiet a new release)...

The only way i maneged to install FC 5 is when i unplugged the XP SATA drive from the PC otherwise there was a no go... (it was the same for the other linux versions aswell) as soon as i unpluged the XP hdd the installation ran as smooth as a hot knive through butter

by the way FC5 is installed on a IDE(PATA) drive and the XP is on a SATA drive

now i have FC5 and XP on the PC but if i want to boot XP i have to unplug the FC5 HDD...
when i was installing FC5 i also installed GRUB with XP(as a non-detected during install)... when i choose to run XP from the GRUB menu i get an error..(no device ..)

the entry for XP in GRUB :

rootnoverify (hd0, 0)
chainloader +1

how can i change the GRUB code to make it look for XP on the SATA drive........ the posts and forums i´ve looked so far don´t help much , at least they don´t help me... i´m sure the solution is probably a simple one...

any help would be apreciated

PS : I can start FC5 from GRUB no problem... and i´ve set XP as default (in GRUB)..
PS2 : forgot to mention now the only way i can start winXP is when the FC5 drive is off....

 

[Nodsu]

Assuming Windows is actually able to boot with the changed drive ordering..

The rootnoverify line says which BIOS hard drive GRUB should look at. You can try sth like "rootnoverify (hd1,0)"

Mind you, operating systems usually fail to boot when hard drive ordering changes.

 

[boykov]

thanks for the reply...

i have tried this already.... nothing
i have also tried rootnoverify (sd1,0) .... since my XP drive is serial ata , but nothing so far ...

at least i maneged to get the net running ...... :hotbounce in FC5

 

[Nodsu]

It is always hdX for hard drives..
You did read the GRUB manual before going and poking around there, right?

"nothing" means what?

 

[boykov]

yes i read the manual http://www.gnu.org/software/grub/manual/grub.html ... not that i undersatnd much of it....
sdx idea came around after looking at other forums (fedora forum)...
anything i´ve changed i changed back.....

nothing .... error 13 : urecognisable or unsupported format ...... or simply freeeeeez with a white line in the top-left corner of the screen....

i know i have to change something i GRUB or add something .... I can not have FC5 as (hd0) and win XP as (hd0)... changing hd0 to hd1 doesn´t work.... at least not by itself.... the 2-nd number (i.e hdx, 0) has to be 0 since XP is on another drive..... or do i change it... from what i´ve read the 2-nd no. only changes if there are 2 OS on the same drive...

i´ve also looked at :
http://fedora.redhat.com/docs/fedora-install-guide-en/fc5/
this is the guide i mainly followed ... i stilll have Red hat guide (printed) and FC4 guide (also printed)

thanks

 

[Mictlantecuhtli]

You can try different root drives in GRUB's command line (press c on the menu).

Just try root (hd0,0) to (hd7,0) or something like that. You'll see the partition GRUB reports, you'll most likely want a NTFS one, I guess.

If you use rootnoverify, you won't see if it's incorrect or not.

When you think you've gotten it right, just type chainloader +1 and boot. Edit the menu.lst likewise.

It's difficult to say to which IDE channels your mainboard maps the SATA channels as you haven't told which board it is, and how you've configured the SATA devices in the BIOS.

 

[boykov]

hi

in the bois everithing is basically in auto, and i could not find anything on SATA..... the only thing i´ve ever changed is the boot sequence...

however i have a promise SATA utility ...
1:MAS (channel ID)

MSI K7N2 delta ILSR (more info on my PC look in profile)

i´ll check your suggestion about GRUB and post my findings

 

[boykov]

after root (hd0,0) to (hd7,0)

i only got 2 hits:
(hd0,0) ext2fs - which FC5
(hd1,0) filesystem type unknown, partition type 0x7

 

[Nodsu]

So hd1 is the Windows disk. When you boot that you get the white blinking cursor, don't you? That's Windows failing to boot, nothing to do with GRUB.

You could try booting Windows the recovery console from the CD and running "fixboot" (not fixmbr) to fix the Windows bootloader.

 

[Mictlantecuhtli]

If Windows fails to boot because it's (hd1,0), try

map (hd1) (hd0)
map (hd0) (hd1)


That swaps the drives "virtually".

 

[WinDoWsMoNoPoLy]

You want to install GRUB on the primary master HD and then set it for dual booting.

Also you should look at the issue that by default Fedora5 does not come with NTFS support, as i'm sure your Windows partitions are NTFS. I'm not sure if this would effect GRUB or not but if you were to reinstall Windows as FAT32 filesystems and then reinstall Linux with the Windows HD attached you could set the mounts for Linux through the install.

My theory is simply that either Fedora doesn't know the Windows HD is there (because it wasn't there when you installed Feodra) or GRUB won't boot it because it doesn't have NTFS support.

Notice that Fedora doesn't have all that autodetect device stuff that Windows has, wouldn't it make since that it doesn't know the HD is there?

I'm just saying you went about setting this up the hard way. You will have to set up the mounts for the windows partitions by command line when you could of done it through the install.

 

[whtddusy516]

I read somewhere that when doing a dualboot system with XP always install XP last otherwise the startup files get all screwy...ive had that happen to me before, but not with linux, so idk if it still applies lol

 

[WinDoWsMoNoPoLy]

You read wrong, in my opinion atleast . It's much easier to have Windows already there when installing linux.

Also, from one of your previous posts:
(hd1,0) filesystem type unknown, partition type 0x7
Fedora doesn't have NTFS support.... filesystem type unknown.........

 

[boykov]

hi

finally got windows to boot from GRUB, but idont know how to save the settings so that i dont have to edit the XP map every time...... !!!!
another thing.... when finally XP booted from GRUB , i got an error that the system has just recovered from a serious error...
i´m speculating that since this is the first time XP is booting with the FC5 hdd pluged in that this is what caused XP to show this error ...

Event Type: Error
Event Source: System Error
Event Category: (102)
Event ID: 1003
Date: 22.5.2006 г.
Time: 12:55:36
User: N/A
Computer: THT-HTH
Description:
Error code 1000008e, parameter1 c0000005, parameter2 bf1477af, parameter3 b728596c, parameter4 00000000.

For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.
Data:
0000: 53 79 73 74 65 6d 20 45 System E
0008: 72 72 6f 72 20 20 45 72 rror Er
0010: 72 6f 72 20 63 6f 64 65 ror code
0018: 20 31 30 30 30 30 30 38 1000008
0020: 65 20 20 50 61 72 61 6d e Param
0028: 65 74 65 72 73 20 63 30 eters c0
0030: 30 30 30 30 30 35 2c 20 000005,
0038: 62 66 31 34 37 37 61 66 bf1477af
0040: 2c 20 62 37 32 38 35 39 , b72859
0048: 36 63 2c 20 30 30 30 30 6c, 0000
0050: 30 30 30 30 0000

it also shows the drive in "my computer" , but there is no info ... 0GB used 0GB free - is this normal...

"fixboot" didn´t help... the only way XP booted was with :
map (hd0,0) (hd1,0)
map (hd1,0) (hd0,0)
unhide (hd1,0)

thanks for all the replies

 

[Nodsu]

You edit the /boot/grub/menu.lst file in Linux and put the commands in there.

An excellent read/write ext filesystem driver for Windows: http://www.fs-driver.org/download.html

 

[Mictlantecuhtli]

My theory is simply that either Fedora doesn't know the Windows HD is there (because it wasn't there when you installed Feodra) or GRUB won't boot it because it doesn't have NTFS support.

The operating system (FC5) doesn't need to be able to read the other filesystem. The boot manager only needs to be told where to find the boot sector of a particular partition.

 

[WinDoWsMoNoPoLy]

Yes, thats why i said it was a theory