Hi all,

I'm using FC4 on my desktop and I'm experiencing a somewhat weird issue trying to revive my Windows XP partition. Windows lives on a separate disk (hdb), with its' own loader. The files belonging to Windows are on the first partition (hdb1). FC4 lives on hda.

If choose hdb as the primary boot device, I get into Windows fine. However, if I try to use grub to boot into Windows, the machine hangs with the following on the screen:

rootnoverify (hd1,0)
chainloader +1

I was thinking to do a rescue on the Windows partition, but I also can't boot from the Windows XP -- it begins loading, and I get the message that my system configuration is being inspected, but after that the screen goes blank and the machine seems to hang.

Interestingly, if I remove hda, the FC4 disk from the system (by disabling it in the BIOS configuration), I'm able to boot from the Windows XP CD just fine.

What I would like to know is:

1) How can I boot into Windows XP install I already have from grub?
2) Why can't I boot from the XP CD to do a rescue?

Here's a copy of my grub.conf file.

# grub.conf generated by anaconda
#
# Note that you do not have to rerun grub after making changes to this file
# NOTICE: You do not have a /boot partition. This means that
# all kernel and initrd paths are relative to /, eg.
# root (hd1,1)
# kernel /boot/vmlinuz-version ro root=/dev/hdb2
# initrd /boot/initrd-version.img
#boot=/dev/hda
default=1
timeout=5
splashimage=(hd0,4)/boot/grub/splash.xpm.gz
hiddenmenu
title Fedora Core (2.6.13-1.1532_FC4)
root (hd0,4)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.13-1.1532_FC4 ro root=LABEL=/ rhgb quiet
initrd /boot/initrd-2.6.13-1.1532_FC4.img
title Fedora Core (2.6.12-1.1456_FC4)
root (hd0,4)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.12-1.1456_FC4 ro root=LABEL=/ rhgb quiet
initrd /boot/initrd-2.6.12-1.1456_FC4.img
title Fedora Core (2.6.12-1.1398_FC4)
root (hd0,4)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.12-1.1398_FC4 ro root=LABEL=/ rhgb quiet
initrd /boot/initrd-2.6.12-1.1398_FC4.img
title Fedora Core (2.6.12-1.1447_FC4)
root (hd0,4)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.12-1.1447_FC4 ro root=LABEL=/ rhgb quiet
initrd /boot/initrd-2.6.12-1.1447_FC4.img
title Fedora Core (2.6.11-1.1369_FC4)
root (hd0,4)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.11-1.1369_FC4 ro root=LABEL=/ rhgb quiet
initrd /boot/initrd-2.6.11-1.1369_FC4.img
title Windows XP
rootnoverify (hd1,0)
chainloader +1


Many thanks in advance.
Cheers,
Misha

put these 2 red lines in the booting choice of XP
There is nothing weird about your case.

Hello Saikee,

Thank you for your suggestion. I am now able to boot into Windows without any problems.

Being the curious soul that I am, I can't help asking -- why are the map commands necessary? A brief Google reveals that they are required when Windows is installed on a slave drive... But why?

Would you also be able to say why it wasn't possible to boot from the XP CD when the master drive (with Linux) is enabled?

Thank you once again, this one was starting to give me a headache...

Cheers,
Misha

You installed XP as the first bootable disk. Inside XP there is a hidden file called boot.ini which recorded XP was installed in the first disk (also additional parameter inside XP itself too). If XP has been moved to another position the check will show something isn't right and XP would then stop being booted to avoid damage.

It is no different to any Linux, BSD or Solaris as they all have a record of their installed position. Change the disk order will result the system fail to boot.

The "map" statement from Grub and the "map-drive" are for overcoming this sort of difficulties.

On the booting order I think you may be confused.

It is possible that your PC has been arranged to boot floppy, CD drive and hard disk in descending order. If there is nothing in the floppy and CD drives the Bios boots the next available choice which is the hard disk. Putting a CD in the CDrom will cause the PC to try the CD first. You should be able to re-arrange the booting queue in any order you like but the floppy-CD-hdd is the stand booting queue in most machines.

cancelled due to repetition

Saikee,

Thanks for explaining the map thing to me. I completely forgot about the boot.ini file.

As for the boot order, I think I didn't describe my problem well enough. With my current boot order, CD-ROM, then IDE0, then IDE1, it looks for the CD in the drive, finds it, and starts booting it. I get a message on the screen saying `Setup is inspecting your computer's hardware configuaration...'. This is the first thing Windows XP Setup says, which is evidence that booting from the CD has started. This message is present for a few seconds and then the screen goes blank. The machine seems to be in a hung state from there.

The problem I described above persists with each reboot. Changing the boot order doesn't seem to influence it at all. The only way I've gotten into XP Setup was by removing the primary master (the Linux drive) from the BIOS configuration altogether. With only the primary slave (the Windows drive) in place, Setup boots fine.

I'm wondering if there's something XP Setup doesn't like about the drive that Linux is on. This isn't a very immediate problem, as I plan to keep Windows and Linux on separate physical drives anyway. But it's still interesting to find out what exactly is the problem here.

Hope I'm making more sense this time.

Cheers,
Michael

Are you telling me that you need a XP CD permanently in the drive in order to boot XP?

I only use the damn disk once and it was when I installed XP.

Grub should fire up XP without the installation CD present.

May be you should paste the content of
here if your XP cannot be booted without the presence of the installation CD.