~HELLLP ~~~~ Double Boot Windows 98 and Linux Problem

Mistro116@yahoo.com · 09-22-2005, 07:29 PM

Problem is as follows, I was following the tutorial listed below. Installed windows and linux fine, changed the partitions renamed them, working great UNTIL THE LAST STEP 13, i went into linux rescue mode and did everything they said, only when i try to restart windows 98, it gives me a cannot find executable file error, I DONT KNOW WHY! Someone help PLZZZ, im so close, if i can get windows 98 to boot properly now, im like home free. Any help would be GREATLY appreciated.

"11. Once done, insert your Windows 98 CD and type D: to get to it and type SETUP to install Windows 98. Go through everything as you would normally when installing Windows 98. The during the process, you will of course do several reboots and you may notice that GRUB is gone. Windows 98 will be the only OS you can get to. Linux is still there but no longer accessible.

12.Once you are happy that Windows is installed, insert RedHat CD 1 again and reboot your PC. At the bootscreen type:
linux rescue

This will get you into rescue mode. It will mount your linux under /mnt/sysimage. Just follow the prompts until you get to the system. Then type:
chroot /mnt/sysimage

This sets the root back to the way it should be if you booted linux normally and puts all file locations back where you expect to find them. Now, in this mode we need to get GRUB to know about the windows partition and also to reinstall the GRUB loader back onto the start of your harddisk (the MBR). Windows overwrote GRUB on the MBR with it's own bootloader. We need to get it back. First we need to add an entry to the grub.conf file. Type:
vi /etc/grub.conf

Press "i" to go into insert mode. This means you can change the file. Scroll down to the end and add a new entry:

title Windows98
rootnoverify (hd0,2)
makeactive
chainloader +1

The purpose of the entry is so that when you restart your system, under the Linux entry, you will see a "Windows98" entry and you will be able to choose between the two operating systems. The title obviously is what will be displayed in GRUB when you start the system. The (hd0,2) means FirstHardDisk,3rd partition (numbering starts from 0). Therefore hd0 means /dev/hda and the 2 means hda3. Finally chainloader... well I don't understand it fully except that you need it and the +1 means to start loading on the first sector + 1. Again, read up if you want to about it (info grub), otherwise just make sure it's there.

To save changes and get out of the vi program, press ESC, then :wq and hit enter.

We've changed the entries for our bootloader screen (GRUB screen) but now we actually have to reinstall GRUB on the MBR and wipe the windows one:
grub-install /dev/hda

13. Ok, so now let's reboot. You should have a GRUB screen with a choice between Windows or Linux. Boot Windows first to check all is ok there. If so, good, if not, let me know. If people have problems using this document, I'd like to change it to be more useful with a broad range of situations. Reboot and we'll check Linux."

aysiu · 09-22-2005, 07:49 PM

It's so complicated to do dual-boots with old distributions. If you like Red Hat, try using Fedora Core 3 or Blag 30000. If you want to try something else, try Mepis 3.3.1 or Ubuntu 5.04. Up-to-date versions of distros make the dual-boot process a lot simpler.

wmakowski · 09-23-2005, 01:03 PM

This problem is not really that complicated since RH9 uses GRUB, the same boot loader used by Ubuntu, Mepis, and Fedora Core. My first thoughts are that the Win98 entry in /etc/grub.conf is not pointing to the correct partition for booting Win98. I'm guessing you can still boot up RH9. If so, send us a listing showing us what your partition table looks like. You can do this using the sfdisk command.

Code:

sfdisk /dev/hda -l

This will return information like...

Code:

   Device Boot Start     End   #cyls    #blocks   Id  System
/dev/hda1   *      0+    522     523-   4200966    b  Win95 FAT32
/dev/hda2        523    1045     523    4200997+  83  Linux
/dev/hda3       1046    2481    1436   11534670    f  Win95 Ext'd (LBA)
/dev/hda4          0       -       0          0    0  Empty
/dev/hda5       1046+   1061      16-    128488+  82  Linux swap
/dev/hda6       1062+   1770     709-   5695011    b  Win95 FAT32
/dev/hda7       1771+   2481     711-   5711076   83  Linux

It would probably save time to post your grub.conf too.

Bill

Tarry · 09-24-2005, 11:30 AM

Download VMWare WorkStation and run as many Os's as you like. I gave up the dual boot long time ago when I ran into trouble of some mem lockdown and eventually had to dump it all. Anyways that's an advice. It's a hott technology and you can do a variety of things than just run an exotic OS.