Windows 98 acts weirdly when booted from GRUB

Ormu · 01-08-2013, 03:12 PM

I installed Debian on an old computer which already had Windows 98 installed. Windows and its original bootloader is on /dev/sda, Debian on /dev/sdb and GRUB on the MBR of /dev/sdb. I also created a FAT32 partition on /dev/sdb to get some extra space to be used in Windows.

However, when Windows 98 is booted via GRUB, it doesn't see the new partition or the CD drives. It also warns about possible virus on the MBR (:D). If I change the BIOS boot order so that it boots the Windows disk directly everything is fine.

Is there a way (more convenient than messing with the BIOS boot menus) to solve this problem? Should I edit some GRUB settings?

My partition scheme:

/dev/sda
===============================
MBR: Windows/DOS bootloader
/dev/sda1: 10GB, FAT32

/dev/sdb
===============================
MBR: GRUB
/dev/sdb1: 250MB, ext2, /boot
/dev/sdb2: 120GB, ext4, /
/dev/sda3: ~38GB, FAT32
/dev/sda4: 1.8GB, swap

Computer specs:

-Compaq motherboard
-AMD K7 Athlon CPU, 500MHz
-128MB RAM
-3dfx Voodoo3 GPU
-HDDs as above
-2x CD drives
-Floppy drive

mostlyharmless · 01-08-2013, 03:42 PM

Grub 0.97 or Grub 2? The old grub could map the drives; if you look at some old threads... Grub 2, I have no idea, it's a PITA. Try google "grub map drives windows" the first entry is http://blog.firetree.net/2005/08/26/...ows-with-grub/

Ormu · 01-09-2013, 03:39 AM

It's GRUB2 (although it says "1.98xyz..." in the boot menu). The config file that apparently contains the Windows entry is /etc/grub.d/30_otheros and it looks like this:

Code:

#!/bin/sh
exec tail -n +3 $0

#<comment>

menuentry "Windows 95/98/Me" {
set root=(hd0,msdos1)
search --no-floppy -fs-uuid --set 157e-1300
drivemap -s (hd0) $root
chainloader +1
}

mostlyharmless · 01-09-2013, 12:20 PM

Well, as I said, I haven't played with grub 2 much. I'd probably backup the MBR on sda and install grub on sda...
Is it Win 98 or the BIOS or another program complaining about a virus? I wasn't aware that Win 98 had a built in virus checker. If it does it is almost certainly obsolete, as are any BIOS virus scanners, so I'd probably disable those.

yancek · 01-09-2013, 02:25 PM

You might take a look at the link below. This person resolved the mapping (post number 2). You might try that. I would make a backup of your windows 98 menuentry in a text file somewhere in case it fails:

http://forums.justlinux.com/showthre...mapping-drives

There is some additional useful information further down in the post if you are interested.
The number in the 'search' line of your entry after 'set' doesn't look right. It is usually a uuid number which you should be able to get by running the blkid command in Linux for your windows 98 partition.

Ormu · 01-20-2013, 10:32 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mostlyharmless

Well, as I said, I haven't played with grub 2 much. I'd probably backup the MBR on sda and install grub on sda...
Is it Win 98 or the BIOS or another program complaining about a virus? I wasn't aware that Win 98 had a built in virus checker. If it does it is almost certainly obsolete, as are any BIOS virus scanners, so I'd probably disable those.

Installing GRUB to /dev/sda is not an option, I wan't to keep the Windows disk untouched.

The virus warning seems to be a feature of Win 98. Did boot sector viruses exist during Windows 98 era? Such a check could actually be useful now that there are MBR-based rootkits in the wild (TDL-4 for example), although most rootkit makers would probably try to disable it right away.

Quote:

Originally Posted by yancek

You might take a look at the link below. This person resolved the mapping (post number 2). You might try that. I would make a backup of your windows 98 menuentry in a text file somewhere in case it fails:

http://forums.justlinux.com/showthre...mapping-drives

There is some additional useful information further down in the post if you are interested.
The number in the 'search' line of your entry after 'set' doesn't look right. It is usually a uuid number which you should be able to get by running the blkid command in Linux for your windows 98 partition.

Thanks, I'll try that out.

John VV · 01-20-2013, 11:28 PM

Quote:

The virus warning seems to be a feature of Win 98. Did boot sector viruses exist during Windows 98 era?

ooohhhh boy did they exist

transferred from 5 in floppy to 5 in floppy and "mac" disk to "mac" disk ( 3.5 hard"floppy" )

m1rr0rm3 · 01-21-2013, 09:48 PM

Come on just use Linux

Ormu · 01-22-2013, 11:24 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by m1rr0rm3

Come on just use Linux

No, I need Windows 98 as the primary use of that computer is to run old software such as legacy phone service tools that don't work properly on modern OSes. I installed Linux just for fun.

Ok, removing the search line results in "invalid signature" error when trying to boot Windows. More tests next weekend...