Installing Windows (again)

NNP · 05-26-2005, 11:51 AM

When i partitioned my HD i left 30GB free just in case I needed Windows to do anything in the future. Well guess what... I do. Unfortunately though im not entirely sure what I should do as regards bootloaders.

LILO is my bootloader and its installed to the harddisk. As far as I know though when I reinstall windows XP it will install its own bootloader over LILO (it happened me before). Im curious as to whether there is anyway to prevent this and keep using LILO to boot both Mandriva and XP.

Thanks,
NNP

abisko00 · 05-26-2005, 11:58 AM

As far as I know there is no way to prevent this. You need to have a bootable medium to get back into your system and then re-install lilo.

niknah · 05-26-2005, 12:03 PM

never used Mandriva but in redhat/fedora you can get the installation CD/floppy and boot up into rescue mode then you can re-run lilo/grub to restore the boot loader.

JrLz · 05-26-2005, 10:07 PM

yeah, you need a boot medium.... rescue cd/ floppy........
but in case you don't.......... there is another way......
You're using windows right now , right?
Try to extract 512 bytes from your linux root(/) partition.....(boot sector) --> just hope you did install lilo here too, not only on MBR
you can use some kind of disk tool / hex editor , etc....
I usually use Winhex.... it's great........
extract the 512 bytes to a file, call it c:\lilo.bin or any you like....
then just hope you can boot it from your windows boot loader
edit your c:\boot.ini file --> this file is hidden
append a line like this
c:\lilo.bin="Linux LILO"
save it and reboot.

hope it helps.....

NNP · 05-29-2005, 11:44 AM

Ok, what i did is boot linux from a cd then enter rescue mode and reinstall LILO. I can now boot linux fine but I've Windows doesnt appear on the boot list of LILO. Does anyone know how i'd go about adding it?

EDIT: Ok, nevermind I found out how. In case anyone else is wondering, i booted into linux opened /etc/lilo.conf and at the end i added the lines

other = /dev/hda3 <--- this is the location of the partition the other OS is on
label = WinXP <-- this can be whatever you want
table = /dev/hda <--- contains the location of the device that has the partition table.

then i ran /sbin/lilo to write the changes.

Thanks,
NNP

phil.d.g · 05-29-2005, 12:09 PM

you need to add this to lilo.conf

Code:

other = /dev/hda1
  label = Windows2000
  table = /dev/hda

and then run lilo to update the changes, change /dev/hda1 to whatever partition your windows install is on

Nevermind, hadn't realised you already edited your own post