Hello
My Linux career started with Mandrake, i soon got rid of it becasue of its unstability (apologies to Mandriva Linux Users, after Mandrake 8.0 I am sure it has come a long way). Then I got hold of Red Hat and thought how on world could i miss this nice distro. But with ever-increasing frustrating experience from playing my mp3 to playing the DVD's, i soon moved to SuSE and have to say that it is something really good. But SuSE is hard to get, i eventually started to use Slackware and found out that it was the fastest, most stable Linux i have ever encountered. It has been that way since.

Lately, after buying a new PC i thought that i explore other distros, which ultimately led me to try Fedora. I am really sorry to say that what Microsoft is to Prorietory Software, RedHat/Fedora is to Opensource software. Fedora is extremely inflexible, specially when you want to use some other boot loader (to share another distro) other then the GRUB (ugly looking compared to simple layout of LILO), Fedora didnot boot. It cannot even boot my Slackware distro (not even it shows Slackware during install, only showing Windows). And after booting Fedora you immediately realize that there is almost nothing in the world called LINUX or LINUS TORVALDS, only Red Hat, Fedora and whatshisname Mr. Guru who used to live in a NewYork flat kicked out by his landlady. Whereever i look into it is FEDORA FEDORA FEDORA FEDORA...as ugly as M$ can be. Fedora Core takes absolute control over your desktop, not allowing any other Linux distro to reside by, only allowing Windows as if there is no operating system in the world other than Windwos and Fedora. And what's more, first time log-in from root, the mahcine went freeze! and there is no way you can play your mp3 becoz its proprieratory! My god, Fedora itself is getting proprietory day by day. This is how it goes, you develop a Linux called Red Hat and its free. as soon as it got a solid brandname and some affiliated Certification course and as soon as big server companies start to use it, you make it commercial and open another free called Fedora. As soon as Fedora gets popularity, you make is commercial and sell it and open another *free* distro called ????..and so on.
I agree that to compete with so many proprietory software companies Linux does need to be handeled in a strategic way that Red Hat vis a vis IBM is doing. But the way it has being done, some day people will forget the names of Linux and Linus Torvalds, they will only know RedHat, IBM Linux, Fedora, ......sigh.
This is my personal opinion only, and i am not suggesting anyone to stop using Fedora.

Just seems like a pointless rant to me. Not to sound rude, but many of the problems you mention seem to be your own personal failings or hardware related. A distro won't work fine for everyone and its something that you should know since you say you used Linux since the Mandrake 8.x days.

I agree with reddazz, many of your problems seem to be just yours. Ive been using FC5 since a couple of months and i find it so complete for me. It is rock solid and runs as a gem. I don't agree with you saying it doesn't allow other OS along it. I got XP,Debian Etch and Ubuntu along with it and im proud to say im using the grub of FC5. Excuse me, what you say, ugly looking?? Well if you'd only known how to customize it bro. I got nothing against lilo but ill say grub rulez!! As for the Redhat rant, you seem to be forgetting what they have done in the first place to bring linux to general desktop users like you and me. Im not saying they are solely responsible but for most of todays linux users, linux started from Redhat (i suppose). And for heaven's sake lets just not talk about Microsoft. Yes, Fedora don't have proprietory stuff like mp3,dvd etc but providing it out of the box beats the very purpose of open-source. Yet you can always get them in a snap. I must say ive grown with Fedora, it has turned me into a better person LOL. Initially i started out bashing Fedora too but its the learning that prevails over everything else in the end. And places like LQ (thanks guys)is what linux is all about.
So stop ranting for nothing. Learn bro,cheers

Didn't any booting problem with Fedora from FC2 to FC5. All still in my box and its Grub is no different to other distros.

In fact I would even say I haven't encounted any booting problem in Linux at all. You can make Grub floppy in FC5 that can boot any system in a PC. May be it is time to take a peep into the Grub Manual.

I used linux since redhat 7.3 and I find the newer distros to be too user friendly. I ran into to many problems with fedora. Driver support for newer video cards even if the drivers are installed there is a problem with loading the correct module. I using ATI X1800xt and used the newest .25 drivers from ati and still wasn't able to load the gui from ati module or fglrx module. Still using vesa module. also ntfs support. Redhat I think 8.0 or 9.0 defualted with ntfs support in the kernel weither built in or module support. next is the kernel compiling problem even if i do it right there is errors with make. then there is bzimage. I don't have a problem with bzImage but when it comes to it the new compilied kernel should show up in the bootloader as custom but it didn't. Also it's not a blooted os so that amazing when you think how blooted the past versions of fedora core was. bootloader i don't care about but I use grub more than lilo. there is a problem with bootloader when you install fedora like if you have a windows partition fedora destory the MBR and install a bootloader. umm if there isn't a MBR and there is a bootloader whats the point? I tired many different ways to install fedora with windows partition but it seems you need to add flags to the main installation of the MBR and bootloader to get windows and fedora to exist side by side. but you are ranting which isn't a problem but your problems are user-errors.

I will say something about the boot loader and the MBR because of the apparent confusion.

Every operating system has a boot loader. To comply with the PC standard the boot loader has to be in two parts; part 1 is always 512 bytes large and Part 2 for the rest. This is necessary because when a PC is booted and a hard disk comes to the top of the queue the BIOS will grab the first 512 bytes from the hard disk for booting purpose. It puts this 512 bytes in the memory and it buggers off to nowhere to be seen again.

Therefore which system deposits its Part-1 in the first 512 bytes in the hard disk, commonly known as the MBR, controls the booting process.

It so happens Windows is one of the most selfish OS and has no intention of booting to other systems, unless its arm is twisted. Its Part-1 is also common to all Dos, Windows, XP and the like in that Part-1 has no direct link to Part-2. The only indirect link is Part-2 must be the active partition. Therefore Windows Part-1 or MBR spend all its time to check which of the 4 primary partitions (maximum number for a hard disk)is active and boot the first one it finds.

Linux does not use active partition for booting. Its Part-1 always declare the partition number and so Linux can be boot from in additional to a primary partitions also any logical partition.

Structurally Windows doesn't boot Linux with its Part-1, although NT version of Windows can be made to overcome it, and so a Linux can only boot if it deposits its Part-1 of the bootloader in the MBR.

Therefore one should not complain about a Linux overwriting Windows MBR because it is an essential step of a Linux installation.

The Part-1 of any operating system can be restored at any time as often as required. Since Windows uses a common Part-1 and so a Dos floppy is good enough to restore the MBR of XP. To restore Part-1 of Lilo or Grub the best tool is to use a Live CD (any one will do). If a user is aware that the boot loaders can be restored so easily perhaps there is no necessity to get ranting about it.

I have several versions of Dos and Windows installed in one computer with over 100 Linux and can confirm that all of them can coexist happily and be booted any way we wish to.

yes I agree with what you say and I know about windows being a hog when it comes to installing another os besides another version of windows. I have came across many of times where it seems linux does infact destory the MBR to the point of where no OS will boot. Back in the day I never understood why you had to install windows first until someone else on th forum explained to me that windows likes to be hte main OS on any system which is windows bootloader installs itself over another bootloader without included the OS that the pasted bootloader came from and never checks the MBR for any other existing OS and then explained to me that the windows bootloader have to be destoried in order for linux to co-exist in a dual booting enviroment which means that windows bootloader is destoried and that linux install its' bootloader and then check the MBR for any other os and then set a path to the OS for dual booting. What i don't understand is the fact of when linux some times destory the MBR of the system. But if it isn't the MBR then it's windows bootloader and grub having a problem or should i say that when linux goes to install the bootloader it destory's windows bootloader and not install its' own.... lol so confusing but I understand what you have explained.

In a standard well-put together distro the installer would allow the boot loader to be installed in a maximum 4 choices

(1) In a floppy
(2) In the MBR of the first bootable disk
(3) In the root partition chosen by the user.
(4) No boot loader installation

There are distros that give less choices and a few don't eve bother to inform the destination when it has been written to go only into the MBR.

However I would say a user is always given the choice or the warning of it if the MBR is about to be overwritten by any Linux installer.

Therefore it is always the user instruction that bring about a Windows MBR overwritten by a Linux boot loader.

I think you are slightly confused between a Grub overwriting Windows MBR with a Grub overwriting another Grub. In both case the boot loader has been replaced but in the latter you see something similar and so under the impression the original boot loader has been destroyed.

It is also possible that in the installation of Linux B with the boot loader of Linux A already in the MBR one can arrange the existing boot loader from Linux A to multi boot the new Linux B. Therefore there is no necessity to overwrite the existing boot loader of Linux A.

I am reasonably certain that the problem is more to do with the user's lack of understanding of the situation.

Try Centos 4.3

Absolutely right saikee. I got FC5 as my main OS and have added XP,Debian and Ubuntu later. Instead of writing the bootloaders of these OS to mbr, i did them onto a floppy. Then all i did was just add the individual entries into my main grub of FC5 by refering to the their individual grub entries from the floppy. Well i guess most of the time its the user who lacks the knowledge

:-D hey, how did you get windows bootloader on floppy? Is it the rescur disk you talking about? boot with rescue disk then do a fixboot or something? sorry just interested in installing windows later after the linux installation the fixboot command is wrong lol

Grub can be put into a floppy.

Grub can boot Xp, regardless it is in a floppy, or a CD or in the MBR of a hard disk.

You can also ask XP's boot loader to boot up Grub instead of XP if Grub is installed in a data-only active primary partition.