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svar 09-19-2003 07:15 AM
hidden dos partition
 
A friend of mine bought an IBM laptop with an NTFS partition
plus a hidden fat32 nodos partition. He tried to use SuSE
live update to install linux, but it failed because of lack of space
He tells me he is left with 3 linux files that he cannot remove and
he can not boot Windows either. Any suggestions?

JZL240I-U 09-19-2003 07:27 AM
Re: hidden dos partition
 
Quote:
Originally posted by svar ... He tried to use SuSE live update to install linux, but it failed because of lack of space. He tells me he is left with 3 linux files that he cannot remove and he can not boot Windows either. Any suggestions?
Huh? An update of a non-existing system? Maybe that's the reason -> [Hypothesis]: Update assumed an existing boot loader (if (SuSE) then (GRUB)) and overwrote the MBR -> Winboot kaputt.

Perhaps. :)

He should download an iso and install from there ... after successful repairs.

michaelk 09-19-2003 08:06 AM
Usually the hidden partition is a backup for recovering the original installed OS.

If you have a W2k or XP install CD boot it up to recovery mode and run the fixmbr app. If windows is still in one peice it should boot again. If not then run whatever recovery CD's came with the laptop to restore windows.

If you want to keep windows you will need to resize the NTFS partition to provide some unallocated space for linux.


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