No option to boot into WinXP (with Ubuntu 8.04 installed)
Hello,
I am a total newbie to Linux. Recently, I have been trying to setup the Ubuntu OS on my WinXP desktop. My desktop originally had Win2K and WinXP installed on 2 separate partitions on a single hard-disk drive. When installing Ubuntu, I had selected to have the Win2k partition deleted and created 3 partitions in which to install Ubuntu, namely Partition 1 Swap Point : / Partition 2 Swap Point : /home Partition 3 Swap Files Installation went smooth enough but when i restarted the computer, there was no option to boot into WinXP. Even when I hit the "ESC" key while boot-up during the GRUB prompt, there were only 3 entries with "Ubuntu" heading, none with no option for WinXP. I have browsed through the forums and came across a similar case. I ran the test that was recommended in that thread using Applications -> Accessories -> Terminal Code:
cd ~/Desktop && wget 'http://home.comcast.net/~ubuntu_grub/boot_info_script.text' && sudo bash boot_info_script.txt Code:
============================= Boot Info Summary: ============================== |
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Sorry, I think the results in the first post got truncated so I append again here
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============================= Boot Info Summary: ============================== Code:
title MS Windows XP Where did I go wrong ? Anyone ? |
Post the output of
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sudo fdisk -l |
Look at the output from the boot info script with partition information:
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Disk /dev/sda: 40.0 GB, 40020664320 bytes |
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Just guessing but, if this computer had w2k and xp, I imagine w2k was inistalled first and on the first primary partition. xp could have been on a logical partition. w2k and xp use the same bootloader so when the xp was installed entries were created in the w2k boot.ini to boot it. You deleted/overwrote the first primary with Ubuntu so those files are gone.
On my first hardrive, I have W98 on the first primary and w2k on the first logical. The w2k boot files are in the w98 partition and both systems are booted from them. If you go to the support.microsoft.com site you can search and find info on this. You won't be able to boot windows from a logical partition without another windows OS on a primary. |
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1) check whether it is a logical partition in the Linux environment ? (maybe with the fdisk command ?) 2) confirm if the bootloader files are still in WinXP ? |
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Now, since you're allowed up to 4 primary partitions (or is it 3 primary + 1 extended? I forget whether an extended partition is also considered a primary), and you're only using 4, maybe you can simply rewrite the partition table to this: Code:
Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System Wait for somebody else to chime in first though, because that may be bad advice which will break things! But logically it seems like it should work. If you try it, make sure you back up the old partition table, and any important data. If it doesn't work, you should be able to just restore the old table, but there's an outside chance you'd need to reinstall Ubuntu because of something I've not thought of. Re your 2nd question - see if there's a boot.ini file on the root of the win partition. Mine (for WinXP) looks like this: Quote:
PS just so you know, in your OP you meant "mount point" rather than "swap point". "swap" means virtual memory - so you can have swap partitions or swap files, but "swap point" means nothing. |
You can have up to 4 primary partitions, one of which can be used as an extended partition in which you can create logical partitions.
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mount the filesystem: sudo mount -t ntfs /dev/sda5 /mnt/xp open a terminal and navigate to xp: cd /mnt/xp look for files: ls -l /mnt/xp/ if you have boot.ini, ntldr, etc... I'm not sure how you would change xp to primary. You should be able to create another primary as you only have 2 now. I'll post back if I figure out how you might do this? |
Found this site which explains how to do this and it is with Ubuntu. The important part starts at Post#6 and I would suggest you read through to the end a couple of times before starting anything.
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1008458 Good Luck! |
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Well, I tried the suggested method in the link above but it didn't work. It was unable to boot into the OS after the changes - there were several error messages about being unable to create the folders in /home. I am now in the process of re-installing Windows. Anyway, thanks for the help guys. Let me know if you need any clarifications on any steps I've done. |
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Shame about XP, but it should work after you reinstall anyway. I think it normally puts the bootloader in the MBR so you'll need to run Grub from a live cd to be able to Ubuntu again. Alternatively you can edit boot.ini and have the Windows bootloader display a boot menu with Ubuntu on there. |
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