a triple boot pickle suse ubuntu winxp

I have all three operating systems on one hard drive. All three are working but I also hade two other hard drives a 120 formated to fat32, which has no issues and a 250gig sata formatted as ext3.
When I installed windows I had the 250 gig drive plugged in and the install didn't recognise the file format. (no suprise) but the 250gig hard drive had a swap partition from a previous install, which I formatted as a fat32 so that I could continue with windows the install.

I then went on to install suse and kubuntu but couldn't figure out why grub would not fire. Untill I decided to unplug the 250 gig and rebooted. Right away grub fires up and I can choose suse and ubuntu but windows does not load (unless I have the 250 gig hard drive plugged in.)When I choose windows xp from grub it asks for a specific dll.
Is there any way to get these three os' to jive together? would destroying the fat 32 partition on the 250 gig drive do the trick?

Can you please tell us what order you have the hard drives installed in?

Which drive is the first drive your bios recognizes?

It sounds as if your 250 SATA is being recognized as your first hard drive. If such is the case then you must install your boot loader (grub or lilo) to that hard drive with the proper configuration settings.

If you aren't sure what drive is your first drive, you can probably check your bios and see which drive is listed first, or check your POST screen.

ok the 120 gig drive was set up the fist drive the second drive was the 250 gig and the 80 gig which has all the operating systems was last. So I figured it best to have the 80 gig first.
Grub fires up right away. But I still get the same problem when I try to access windows.
It says the /system32/hal.dll is missing or corrupt.
I know this is not a windows help forum but any advice would be great thanks.

I think you may need to do a two part re-configuration here. First, restore Windows boot loader into MBR of the now 1st drive (the 80GB PATA drive) to set up it's boot files properly in it's PBR (partition boot record, first sector of partition). Then after Windows is booting properly, reconfigure Grub. Make sure to have all three drive plugged in. To restore Windows XP boot loader:

To restore Windows XP MBR

1: Boot with Windows XP CD in the drive
2: Hit any key to boot from the CD
3: Wait for installer to load drivers in memory
4: When asked to press enter to install, type: r
5: When asked which Windows installation would you like to log onto, 
if there is only one listed, type: 1  (and hit enter)
6: When asked to type the Administrator password, I hit enter without 
typing anything which will be the administrator password for most OEM 
Windows installations, (No password). If you installed Windows XP 
yourself and added an administrator password, type this password.
7: At the prompt type: fixmbr   (and hit enter)
-**CAUTION** and a warning appear
8: When asked "Are you sure you want to write a new MBR?:" type: y
-The new master boot record has been successfully written.
9: When the prompt returns, type: exit
-The computer re-boots and Windows kernel is loaded.

Boot into the Linux that has the configuration files for grub with the installation disk, (master grub, probably the second one installed), in a terminal, type: fdisk -l to see your partition layout. If you know which Linux has the master grub configuration (the one with /boot/grub/menu.lst that has both Linux listed), let's say it is in partition /dev/hda3, from a terminal as root issue these four commands:

grub
root (hd0,2)
setup (hd0)
quit

Optimally, you should have the 80GB drive as master plugged into the end connector of the IDE cable, the 120GB drive as slave plugged into the middle connector of the IDE cable and the jumpers on both drives set accordingly, and have the bios boot the master IDE drive first.

Originally Posted by Junior Hacker I think you may need to do a two part re-configuration here. First, restore Windows boot loader into MBR of the now 1st drive (the 80GB PATA drive) to set up it's boot files properly in it's PBR (partition boot record, first sector of partition). Then after Windows is booting properly, reconfigure Grub. Make sure to have all three drive plugged in. To restore Windows XP boot loader: To restore Windows XP MBR 1: Boot with Windows XP CD in the drive 2: Hit any key to boot from the CD 3: Wait for installer to load drivers in memory 4: When asked to press enter to install, type: r 5: When asked which Windows installation would you like to log onto, if there is only one listed, type: 1 (and hit enter) 6: When asked to type the Administrator password, I hit enter without typing anything which will be the administrator password for most OEM Windows installations, (No password). If you installed Windows XP yourself and added an administrator password, type this password. 7: At the prompt type: fixmbr (and hit enter) -**CAUTION** and a warning appear 8: When asked "Are you sure you want to write a new MBR?:" type: y -The new master boot record has been successfully written. 9: When the prompt returns, type: exit -The computer re-boots and Windows kernel is loaded. Boot into the Linux that has the configuration files for grub with the installation disk, (master grub, probably the second one installed), in a terminal, type: fdisk -l to see your partition layout. If you know which Linux has the master grub configuration (the one with /boot/grub/menu.lst that has both Linux listed), let's say it is in partition /dev/hda3, from a terminal as root issue these four commands: grub root (hd0,2) setup (hd0) quit Optimally, you should have the 80GB drive as master plugged into the end connector of the IDE cable, the 120GB drive as slave plugged into the middle connector of the IDE cable and the jumpers on both drives set accordingly, and have the bios boot the master IDE drive first.

I get stuck on step 4.When asked to press enter to install, type: r
nothing happens.
I do have a hacked version of xp, windows xp ultimate edition was the name it was going by. Maybe I'll see if I have any other windows cd's around. I don't suppose windows 98 would do the trick, would it?

No, win98 won't do it. Have you tried a capital (R) and hit enter. I have Windows Vista ultimate edition, never heard of Windows XP ultimate edition, must be a custom made disk. If it actually is Vista and not XP, here's a link to restoring Vista MBR:
http://auscoder.com/2007-05-18/resto...ootloader.html

No its definatly not vista. It is a custom made cd.
I'll try the shift+R.

I do remember seeing it as a torrent download at one of those "great" torrent download sites, I instantly thought this was a custom jobby. Might have to take the route you mentioned and borrow someone else's disk, or download a torrent of the original XP disk.

will do, thanks for your help.
I'll let you know if I run into any more snags