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Old 02-17-2006, 04:11 PM   #1
SpiderIRE
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Registered: Jan 2005
Distribution: FC (Planet CCRMA Kernel)
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Strange Dual Boot Problem


I have an old laptop I wanted to dual boot between Windows XP Pro, and FC3. So i parted the single hard drive so that they both had the same amount of space. I installed both operating sytems without any problems but now i can't boot into windows XP. I can boot into Linux, but not windows. My grub.conf file looks like this (couldn't be bothered typing out the whole linux kernel bit-it works fine):

default=0
timeout=5
splashimage=(hd0,1) /boot/grub/splashimage.xpm.gz
hiddenmenu
title Fedora Core
root (hd0, 1)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2......... blah blah etc.
title Windows XP
rootnoverify (hd0,0)
chainloader +1

So if i select Windows XP from the grub menu it brings up that screen that says it was unable to boot windows-you know the one i mean-where it asks would you like to start windows with networking, or last known configuration, or normally etc. None of these options work-it just leaves me with a blank screen that goes no where!

So does anyone know how i can resolve this issue? Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks,
-David
 
Old 02-17-2006, 04:15 PM   #2
pljvaldez
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Registered: Dec 2005
Location: Somewhere on the String
Distribution: Debian Wheezy (x86)
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Try booting windows with your recovery CD and repair the install. Sounds like it got borked up when you installed linux.

Oh, and you did install XP to the first partition, right?
 
Old 02-17-2006, 04:20 PM   #3
SpiderIRE
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yeah its on the first partition.

Now for the stupid question-how do i repair this?? Sorry-but its late where i am!

Thanks,
-David
 
Old 02-17-2006, 04:29 PM   #4
pljvaldez
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You should be able to boot from your XP CD and it should ask you if you want to boot from hard drive, repair, install, etc. Select repair. Then let it do it's magic. Then you'll have to boot from your linux CD in rescue mode and reinstall grub to hd0. I think the command is grub-install hd0, but you'll have to google on that one...
 
Old 02-17-2006, 04:39 PM   #5
SpiderIRE
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alright, thanks! I'll give that a go in the morning!

Cheers,
-David
 
Old 02-17-2006, 08:15 PM   #6
pixellany
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You can also put GRUB on a floppy---then it will never mess up the Windows mbr.
 
Old 02-18-2006, 05:36 AM   #7
SpiderIRE
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Distribution: FC (Planet CCRMA Kernel)
Posts: 81

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thanks to everyone who replied-got it sorted in the end! Followed the instructions here:

http://www.geocities.com/epark/linux...w2k-HOWTO.html

Thought i'd post in case anyone else had the same problem!
But thanks again!

-David
 
  


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