FAT32 partition on a linux box.

Hello all,

I have a general question regarding win98 and where it can boot from on a linux box. I have a Fedora box with the following partitions:

/dev/hda1 /boot (75mb)
/dev/hda2 / (60GIG)
/dev/hda3 SWAP (512MB)
/dev/hda4 /mnt/windows (15GIG)

I have a 15 gig fat32 partition purly to test out my Radeon 9600XT (been having trouble getting linux drivers working but that's not my issue for now)

I have formatted /dev/hda4 as FAT32 the full thing at 15 GIG. Can I install win 98 to this partition and expect lilo to boot it even though it is so far away from the start of the disk?

I realise the install from win 98 will kill the MBR so I'll have to restore it. But after that, is it technically possible to boot win98 that far into the disk map?

This may be very difficult, windows has a real issue about having the first possible MBR

It is definately staying as last on the drive. But I wonder is it actually possible?

I think it would be a hell of a neat trick

it should work, to boot I mean:
In grub ( I don't know lilo) it is done with the
root=windows drive/part.
noverify

-Joey

Cool thanx. I'll give that a go. Actually it is GRUB, I don't know why I said lilo. I think I am missing the NOVERIFY part.

glad I could help

-Joey

these are from the Partition Magic help file............just an FYI

Understanding the 2 GB Boot Code Boundary An OS's boot code is stored in both the master boot record (MBR) and the partition boot record, enabling the OS to boot properly. In some OSs, however, this boot code is written is such a way that it inadvertently imposes a limit on the location of both the partition boot record and the files needed to boot the OS. DOS (versions 6.x and earlier) and Windows NT (versions 4.0 and earlier) are both affected by this boot code limitation. When booting these two operating systems, the cylinder-head-sector (CHS) address of the beginning boot code sector must be calculated in order to retrieve the sector's information and load and execute the next part of the boot process. The CHS value for the needed sector is calculated as follows: Sector Number / Sectors Per Track Because of the way the boot code is written, the product of this calculation must fit in a 16-bit register. The largest value a 16-bit register can contain is 64K. If the number is larger than 64K, the number is truncated, resulting in an incorrect value that skews the remaining calculations. The boot process fails to load and execute the needed sector, thus preventing the OS from booting. Most current hard disks have 63 sectors per track, creating a 64K boot code boundary at 2 GB. If your disk is older and/or uses drive overlay software, this boundary may be lower. If a partition begins or extends beyond this boundary, the CHS value of the partition's boot code sector cannot be correctly calculated; therefore, the partition and its OS cannot boot. This same limit applies to the DOS IO.SYS file and the Windows NT file, NTLOADER.EXE. If either of these files are installed or moved beyond the 64K boot code boundary, the corresponding OS fails to boot. To boot properly, DOS requires that the first three sectors of IO.SYS be below the 2 GB boot code boundary. Both the IO.SYS and NTLOADER.EXE files are usually located near the beginning of the partition in which they are installed. When you resize partitions using PartitionMagic, this area of the partition may be vacated to make room for a larger FAT or other file system structures. As a result, IO.SYS or NTLOADER.EXE may be moved beyond the 2 GB boundary, thus preventing the OS from booting. The disk map in the PartitionMagic main window displays an arrow indicator at the 2 GB boot boundary, so you can see where your partitions are located.

Understanding the BIOS 1024 Cylinder Limit The BIOS 1024 cylinder limitation exists because the start and end cylinder values in the partition table (and some BIOSs) have a maximum value of 1024. Because some operating systems such as DOS 6.22 use the CHS (Cylinder, Head, and Sector) values to address sectors on the disk, they cannot access sectors beyond the 1024 cylinder. When you start your computer the BIOS boots the operating system using the CHS values to locate the first sector of the bootable partition. If the partition starts past the 1024 cylinder, the BIOS may not be able to boot it because it cannot address a cylinder number higher than 1024. With PartitionMagic, you can safely partition any drive, regardless of the number of cylinders on the drive. In fact, to prevent you from performing partition operations that might cause problems, PartitionMagic is careful to observe the BIOS 1,024 cylinder limit on computer systems where one or more of the following applies: · The hard disk has a capacity 504 MB or more and the BIOS translation mode is set to Normal or CHS. · The hard disk has a capacity 504 MB or more and the BIOS was manufactured prior to 1994 (approximately). · The hard disk has a capacity 8 GB or more. If you have such a computer system and you use only DOS, neither the DOS FDISK utility nor PartitionMagic lets you see cylinders beyond the 1,024th cylinder or include them in any partition. Space beyond the 1,024th cylinder always remains invisible. Even if the BIOS 1,024 cylinder limit applies to your system, you can use PartitionMagic without difficulty. The only instance where you may encounter a problem is if all the following criteria apply: · You use DOS and another OS. · The other OS can "see" and use disk space past the first 1,024 cylinders on the disk. · You use PartitionMagic or the FDISK utility of the other OS to create a partition extending beyond the 1,024th cylinder. · You then run the DOS PartitionMagic executable. When you run the DOS PartitionMagic executable, you may or may not be able to see the newly-created partition that extends beyond the 1,024 cylinder limit. Even if you can see the partition, you cannot use the DOS PartitionMagic executable to perform any operations on that partition. This restriction applies to both primary and extended partitions that contain space beyond the 1,024th cylinder. If an extended partition exceeds the cylinder limit, you cannot perform operations on any one of the contained logical partitions, even if the logical partition itself does not extend past the 1,024th cylinder. The disk map in the PartitionMagic main window displays an arrow indicator at the 1024 cylinder boundary (and the 2 GB boot boundary), so you can see where your partitions are located relative to the 1024 cylinder limit. Be sure that all OS partitions on a disk start prior to cylinder 1024. This ensures that you can boot the OS. Also, use caution when moving a bootable partition; if the partition is moved beyond cylinder 1024 it may no longer be bootable. To fix this problem you can move the partition below the 1024 cylinder marker. Tips · If you use DOS, but your system has the INT 13 BIOS extensions, PartitionMagic lets you see cylinders past the normal 1,024 limit and perform operations on partitions extending beyond this boundary.

Thanks for the infos guys. I think it's actually working. I boot the windows list and I get INSERT BOOT DISK. Might try installing windows from CD this time (before I just copied windows and boot files from a windows box) and see if it boots.

try
chainloader +1

Yep, chainerloader + 1 is already there.

Ok, I managed to get it working! It's not so hard either. Just as long as you use linux to format the large FAT32 LBA partition, and then install windows 98, it will install to the FAT32 partition nicely.

Of course, the MBR is overwritten with windows. To six this, I used the Fedora CD to boot and typed:

linux rescue
chroot /mnt/sysimage

..to get a reasonable working linux up. Then used:

grub-install /dev/hda

..to reactivate my grub MBR.

Of course, I had to make sure that my /etc/grub.conf was correct.

So I can happily confirm that you can easily dual boot with linux as your first set of paritions and then have windows 98 second edition on a rather large partition (15gig) at the end of the drive successfully and boot either.

Maybe I should document this for the success stories section.