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Hi I have been researching dual boot system setup for some time now. The computer I purchased came preloaded with W******* XP Home on NTFS partition and a recovery partition in FAT32. I used Partition Magic to create an EXT2 partition for Fedora then installed Fedora 8. I am fairly certain that I should have choosen to customize the parameter about choosing the MBR or 1st boot sector something-or-other with regards to booting.
Nevertheless, Fedora works great. XP OS; however, doesn't show up in the GRUB boot menu because of the install mistake I just know I must have made. I was reading suggestions from similar postings and found that it might be usefull to post the following here to help pinpoint the problem making sure I have the choice of booting the other OS when needed:
results from entering this code:
Code:
sudo fdisk -l
looks like this:
Code:
Disk /dev/sda: 80.0 GB, 80026361856 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 9729 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x4b36bdea
Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 674 7880 57890227+ 17 Hidden HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda2 65 673 4891761 1b Hidden W95 FAT32
/dev/sda3 * 1 26 208813+ 83 Linux
/dev/sda4 7881 9729 14852092+ 5 Extended
/dev/sda5 7881 9729 14852061 8e Linux LVM
Partition table entries are not in disk order
Disk /dev/dm-0: 13.0 GB 13086228480 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 252 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x30307800
Disk /dev/dm-1 doesn't contain a valid partition table
Also the results from entering this code:
Code:
gedit /boot/grub/menu.lst
look like this:
Code:
# grub.conf generated by anaconda
#
# Note that you do not have to rerun grub after making changes to this # file
# Notice: You have a /boot partition. This means all kernel and
# initrd paths are relative to /boot/ , eg.
# root (hd0,2)
# kernel /vmlinuz-version ro root=/dev/VolGroup00/LogVol00
# initrd /initrd-version.img
#boot=/dev/sda
default=0
timeout=5
splashimage=(hd0,2)/grub/splash.xpm.gz
hiddenmenu
title Fedora (2.6.25.14-69.fc8)
root (hd0,2)
kernel /vwlinuz-2.6.25.14-69.fc8 ro root=/dev/VolGroup00/LogVol00 rhgb quiet
initrd /initrd-2.6.25.14-69.fc9.img
title Fedora (2.6.23.1-42.fc8)
root (hd0,2)
kernel /vmlinuz-2.6.23.1-42.fc8 ro root=/dev/VolGroup00/LogVol00 rhgp quiet
initrd /initrd-2.6.23.1-42.fc8.img
I hand typed the above results; they are not appended directly or anything. I tried not to mak any mistakes in copying the code(Just wanted some practice with the Linux synax.) So forgive me if there are mistakes there. As always thanks for reading and/or helping. Any other commands that result in system information, that I should add to the post, would be no problem just let me know which listings to produce.
Windows doesn't show up because there's no stanza for it in the GRUB config file (perhaps that's because you chose not to have it added when you installed Fedora, but I don't know). You might like to have a look at the GRUB documentation: http://www.gnu.org/software/grub/man...OS_002fWindows. Edit: do you have Internet access on your Linux machine? You could have just copied and pasted the output, rather than writing it all out..
Thank you to two above responders. I tried the following in an attempt to get the GRUB to boot XP:
I signed on as the root and enter:
Code:
vi /root/grub/menu.lst
I deleted the line that above the first stanza:
Code:
hiddenmenu
In its place I put the foollowing:
Code:
title WinDoze
rootnoverify (hd0,0)
chainloader +1
I then wrote and quit from the vi editor, signed off and rebooted the computer. The GRUB came along and gave me the option to boot into Fedora or WinDoze. I tried WinDoze and the screen says this:
Code:
Booting 'WinDoze'
chainloader +1
Error 13: Invalid or unsupported executable format
Press any key to continue..._
Do I have the right idea that I should be trying to edit the file /root/grub/menu.lst ? Any suggestions about getting the other OS to be able to boot?
Do I have the right idea that I should be trying to edit the file /root/grub/menu.lst ?
Presumably that's a typo and you actually meant /boot. I don't know too much about GRUB, so someone else will have to step in here. You might want to try googling that error message in the meantime.
I'm having trouble understanding how the partitions got this way:
Code:
Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 674 7880 57890227+ 17 Hidden HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda2 65 673 4891761 1b Hidden W95 FAT32
/dev/sda3 * 1 26 208813+ 83 Linux
/dev/sda4 7881 9729 14852092+ 5 Extended
/dev/sda5 7881 9729 14852061 8e Linux LVM
Presumably, you started with the windows partitions beginning at cylinder #1, and the FAT32 being the first partition. In partition magic, did you move the windows partitions, resize them, or maybe both?
Then--just guessing--the Fedora installer saw the empty space before cylinder 65 and stuck Linux /boot in there??
Just for kicks, boot into Fedora, open a terminal and enter "su" to become root.
enter the dd command below and see if you get the same result:
Code:
dd if=/dev/sda1 bs=16 skip=32 count=1|hexdump -C
1+0 records in
1+0 records out
16 bytes (16 B) copied, 6.0619e-05 seconds, 264 kB/s
00000000 05 00 4e 00 54 00 4c 00 44 00 52 00 04 00 24 00 |..N.T.L.D.R...$.|
00000010
we also might get some clues from the raw data from the partition table:
Again, in a terminal:
Code:
dd if=/dev/sda bs=1 skip=446 count=64|hexdump -C
Post the results here.
I can't promise where any of this is going to lead. In situations like this, I usually just re-install everything.
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