I have just finished installing “Fedora 6” on a second hard-drive (Slave) in combination with “Windows XP” on my primary hard-drive (Master). The installation program has put grub on my first drive. The problem is that the computer automatically boots into XP and it does not give me the option to boot into Linux.

I am a newbie to Linux and any help would be appreciated. P.S. my XP drive is formatted as NTFS which might be part of the problem?

In /boot/grub/menu.lst alter option <default_boot> to number of your favorit system.

Is there a boot menu or does it just boot to XP with no other option and no chance for user interaction? If you get no boot menu you will likely need to re-install GRUB using the Fedora install CD1 or DVD.

This may help: http://pixellany.com/boot.html

(My attempt at a GRUB and booting mini-tutorial)

Hmm, tried to do that but it tells me that it can’t find the kernel and refuses to replace Grub!!

I don't want to insult you but you did everything exactly as you were supposed to with the rescue method? Did rescue give any errors like it can't find the partition? Did you chroot /mnt/sysimage? What happens when you type grub-install /dev/hda?

When I type (grub-install /dev/hda) it gives the message (/dev/hdb2 does not have any corresponding bios drive). I tried the same command again and this time it told me (sbin/grub: Not found)

When you boot the rescue mode and are at the command prompt type fdisk /dev/hda or fdisk /dev/sda. Post the output of that command here. If you look at the output it might help you discover your boot partition.

Disk /dev/hda: 60.0 GB, 60022480896 Bytes 255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 7297 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

Device Boot Start End Id System
/dev/hda1 * 1 7288 7 HPFS/NTFS


Disk /dev/hdb: 120.0 GB, 120034123776 bytes 255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 14593 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

Device Boot Start End Id System
/dev/hdb1 7224 14462 17 Hidden HPFS/NTFS
/dev/hdb2 * 1 13 83 Linux
/dev/hdb3 14 7223 8e Linux LVM

I just ran (grub) and tried to manually install it (root (hd0,0)) and it gives the following output (Filesystem type unknown, partition type 0x7). Looks like I will have to create a FAT32 part to put grub on the disk?

The correct syntax would be grub-install /dev/hda. I've seen many posts regarding grub and LVM. I've never used LVM so I'm not a lot of help. I don't even know if you need to point to /dev/hdb2 or /dev/hdb3 to get the system to boot. Oh, and no, I don't think you need to create a FAT32 partition. Everyone that uses NTFS boots just fine that way.

Hi Techno T & Glennzo,That did not work because your Fedora /boot directory is (hd1,1) not (hd0,0). Creating a FAT32 partition can be useful but is not necessary for that reason.When the grub-install command is run in that way, it will read the device.map file. It returned that error because /dev/hdb is not mapped to a BIOS drive in the device.map file (a common thing). If you add the --recheck option to the grub-install command, it will ignore the device.map file, probe devices instead and write a new device.map file. For a simple hardware setup like yours with just two IDE drives, I am fairly certain that grub-install with the --recheck option will get things right. Try the command like this...WARNING: This command will install GRUB in the master boot record of /dev/hda. That is a popular and normal thing to do, but you have not yet clearly indicated that you understand that is what you have been trying to do. Installing GRUB there will remove the normal boot code that has been booting XP. This can be reversed later with various utilities. If this grub-install command runs successfully, you will see the GRUB menu at bootup from now on. You will choose XP or Fedora from the menu. If you do not choose, the default system will boot after a certain time. You can set the default system and the time delay by editing /boot/grub/grub.conf. There is a slight possibility that you will need to additionally tweak grub.conf to get XP to boot. Finally, if you have not done so, you should stop all of this and backup your important data and files on the XP drive.

Fedora Core 6 Install

This by all means may not work for everybody.

I run an Intel D865perl motherboard with 2.6 gig Intel processor with 1 gig of ram. Two 250 gig
hard drives. The first hard drive is for Windows XP. Second hard drive is for Fedora and data
backups.

Drive 2 the first 40 gig is Fedora and the second 210 gig is for files backups and Norton ghost 2006
images. Which I never doing anything without a current image file it will save your butt.

Install Fedora Core 6 on the second hard drive and use the automatic partitioning tool but don't
put grub on your Master MBR put it on the first sector on your second drive. When you get to the
Boot Loader Configuration screen make sure you check the Configure advanced boot loader
options. The next screen will give the option where to put Grub Boot Loader. It should say like
hda or hdb. Hda is usually your XP Drive. From their finish loading. Put it on hdb.

Now duel booting using XP boot manager (My Preference. I don't like third party boot managers.)

Use your rescue CD to boot to Fedora.
Hit enter at the boot prompt.
Hit enter for English
Hit enter for us
Setup network select no
At the rescue screen select continue
At the next rescue screen hit enter
Now you have a prompt sh-3.00#
At the prompt type in chroot /mnt/sysimage
If hdb2 is Not your boot partition, change it as appropriate. Type: df then determine which hda#
Run the command dd if=/dev/hdb2 of=boot.lnx bs=512 count=1
You should see
1+0 records in
1+0 records out
Type ls and you should see a file named boot.lnx
Put a blank floppy disk in your a: drive
Type mcopy boot.lnx a:
It should have copied the file to your a: drive

Now reboot to Windows

Copy boot.lnx to your root directory
Right click on your boot.ini file select properties and uncheck read only click ok
Double click your boot.ini file and add one line at the end it should read
C:\boot.lnx="Fedora Core 6". Then save it. When you reboot your XP boot
manager will come up and you can chose Fedora it jumps to the Grub Boot manager on your
second drive.

My file looks like this

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(0)(1)\windows
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(0)(1)\windows="Microsoft Windows XP Pro SP2"
/fastdetect /NoExecute=OptIn
c:\boot.lnx="Fedora Core 6 Project"

You call it anything you want

Fedora Core 6 Install

This by all means may not work for everybody.

I run an Intel D865perl motherboard with 2.6 gig Intel processor with 1 gig of ram. Two IDE 250 gig
hard drives. The first hard drive is for Windows XP. Second hard drive is for Fedora and data
backups.

Drive 2 the first 40 gig is Fedora and the second 210 gig is for files backups and Norton ghost 2007
images. Which I never doing anything without a current image file it will save your butt.

Install Fedora Core 6 on the second hard drive and use the automatic partitioning tool but don't
put grub on your Master MBR put it on the first sector on your second drive. When you get to the
Boot Loader Configuration screen make sure you check the Configure advanced boot loader
options. The next screen will give the option where to put Grub Boot Loader. It should say like
hda or hdb. Hda is usually your XP Drive. Put it on hdb. From their finish loading.

Now duel booting using XP boot manager (My Preference. I don't like third party boot managers.)

Use your rescue CD to boot for Fedora or your DVD or #1 install CD.
At the boot prompt press F2 or type linux rescue.
Hit enter for English
Hit enter for us
Setup network select no
At the rescue screen select continue
At the next rescue screen hit enter
Now you have a prompt sh-3.00#
At the prompt type in chroot /mnt/sysimage
If hdb2 is Not your boot partition, change it as appropriate. Type: df then determine which hda#
(Note: Mine reads /dev/hdb2)
Run the command dd if=/dev/hdb2 of=boot.lnx bs=512 count=1
You should see
1+0 records in
1+0 records out
Type ls and you should see a file named boot.lnx
At the prompt type mkdir /download
At the prompt type cp boot.lnx /download (Note: do a cd /download and then ls to see if it copied it
there if it did move on to next step)
Type mkisofs -o data.iso -r /download (Note: type ls you should see a file called data.iso)
At the prompt type dmesg your going to have to find your cd Burner in here. ( Note:It's a lot of info)
( Mine reads hdc: memorex 16x-DDL-IN, ATAPI CD/DVD-ROM drive)
(Mine reads hdd: Memorex DVD16+/-DL4RW1D2,ATAPI CD-/DVD-ROM drive)
From here insert a CD-R or A CD-RW into the CD burner
Type cdrecord -v dev=/dev/hdd data.iso
It should have copied the file to your CD burner (Note: If you have another Windows Computer you
Can check to see if the file is there. It should have the boot.lnx on it.)

Now reboot to Windows

Copy boot.lnx to your root directory
Right click on your boot.ini file select properties and uncheck read only click ok
Double click your boot.ini file and add one line at the end it should read
C:\boot.lnx="Fedora Core 6". Then save it. When you reboot your XP boot
manager will come up and you can chose Fedora it jumps to the Grub Boot manager on your
second drive.

My file looks like this

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(0)(1)\windows
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(0)(1)\windows="Microsoft Windows XP Pro SP2"
/fastdetect /NoExecute=OptIn
c:\boot.lnx="Fedora Core 6 Project"

You call it anything you want

Thanks for all the feedback,

In the meantime I have managed to get fedora up and running and have made it my (C:/hda) drive. So now my drive with XP is the (E:/hdb) drive in Grub lingo this means (hd 0,2 and hd 1,0) or something along those lines. It just makes more sense. Now all I have to do is getting my XP to boot from the grub boot loader. And with all your suggestions and a bit of reading I should be able to work it out. Once again Thanks for your suggestions, will let you know once I get it up and running.

id didn't know that u could put grub on one drive or MBR and have it point to anouther drive.
has anyone done this yet? and dose it work?