triple boot?

ok i just fromated my machine
i loaded xp!---- worked (not that any thing microsoft releases really works!)
then i installed fedora! -----no probs!!!!
then i tried to install suse 9.0 ( sombody needs to tell them about bootable cd's!)

it worked but apperantly it found fedora and updated it self on to it!!
so i am only booting xp and suse!
so i stuck in fedora cd1 and ran the installl again --- i repaired the boot loader (recomended) and again just XP but this time fedora and no suse!

can any one help me with this???
thanks!

Okay, there is some very good documentation about dual, triple,quad etc booting over at www.tldp.org.

Here is what I would do since you are at an early stage of installment.

1. WinXP is installed so leave it alone, if not then install it and move on.
2. Let's start with RH9, put in CD1 and choose new installation. Go through the steps to install and put the Grub bootloader onto the MBR (master boot record). After RH9 is installed, reboot and make sure Grub is working properly before moving onto SuSE.

3. With WinXP and RH9 installed and working then put in CD1 of SuSE and reboot. When the installation starts tell it you want a "new installation", and go through the steps but don't make a separate /boot partition. Now when you get to the boot loader part, tell it to put it onto your root partition. After installation make sure you write down the entry in /boot/grub/menu.lst file.

After SuSE is done installing, reboot and when Grub loads up you will see that you only have choices for WinXP and RH9, don't worry. Now boot up RH9 and edit your menu.lst file in /boot/grub directory to add the info to boot SuSE.

rberry88

Originally posted by genghis it worked but apperantly it found fedora and updated it self on to it!! so i am only booting xp and suse!

when installing suse (or rh) do not stick to the defaults but make sure you use different partitions for rh and suse. you can use the same partition for rh's and suse's /home but you should use different usernames when doing so.

can i use the same swap space also???

The Linux boot loaders usually do not detect and correctly configure other Linux distros.
If you are installing the same bootlaoder with each distro, just mount the other distro, read the bootloader configuration file and add the parameters for the missing distro to the bootloader you wish to use as the main one.
Are you using Lilo or Grub?

"can i use the same swap space also???"

Yes.

___________________________________
Be prepared. Create a LifeBoat CD.
http://users.rcn.com/srstites/LifeBo...home.page.html

Steve Stites

grub

and
how????? (swap)

depends on whether your swap is a file or a partition. If it's a partition, you just tell the installer to use that partition the same way you told the RedHat installer to do....so you'd have one partition for XP, one for swap, one for RH, and one for SuSE.
If it's a file, I really don't know.

BTW, SuSE disks are bootable.

"how????? (swap)"

Each Linux system finds swap through an entry in /etc/fstab. Set the swap entry in both Fedora and SuSE to point to the same swap partition.


___________________________________
Be prepared. Create a LifeBoat CD.
http://users.rcn.com/srstites/LifeBo...home.page.html

Steve Stites

ok here how far ive reached ive installed xp and fedora bot working fine!!!
but i cant mount the suse partition to read the menu.lst file! the suse instillation went fine and i installed the boot partition on the / partition.

this is what my fdisk - l looks like

[root@localhost root]# fdisk -l

Disk /dev/hdb: 61.4 GB, 61492838400 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 7476 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/hdb1 * 1 4844 38909398+ 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/hdb2 4845 4858 112455 83 Linux
/dev/hdb3 4859 5942 8707230 83 Linux
/dev/hdb4 5943 7476 12321855 f Win95 Ext'd (LBA)
/dev/hdb5 5943 6006 514048+ 82 Linux swap
/dev/hdb6 6007 6070 514048+ 82 Linux swap
/dev/hdb7 6071 7476 11293663+ 83 Linux

hdb7 is the suse partition
i tried to mount it using
mount /dev/hdb7 /mnt/suse -t ext2 -w
i also tried it as ext3
but i am not sure this is the right mount command
its not showing up in kdisk free or i would have done it using the gui
thanks!

The entry in SuSE's menu.lst file needs to be added to the menu.lst file of Red Hat. Edit the menu.lst file while in RH to include the lines to boot SuSE.

You will only use one menu.lst file from one distro when booting.

rberry88

IT WORKS!!!!!!!!!!!
THANKS GUYS!!!
this site rocks!!!!!!!!!