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Old 02-10-2003, 12:37 PM   #1
HKILP7M8
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Registered: Feb 2003
Location: New York City
Distribution: SuSe Linux 8.1 Pro
Posts: 6

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Need help with Tri-boot situation


I'm a total newbie and I hope you guys can help me. I actually have 2 problems(Probably more that I don't know of yet).
The first thing is, I've installed SuSe Linux 8.1 Pro on my IBM Thinkpad T30, I'm running Windows XP and Windows Server 2003. After many re-installs and having to re-load all my software, I finally have both Windows OS's running smoothly. The problem is with Linux, I can only boot it from the CD. I was told that I would be able to make a boot floppy of Grub, then copy it over to Windows and get the system to boot from the original splash screen. I can't seem to make a boot floppy, I don't know if it's that my system does not recognize the drive or that I'm doing something wrong. Maybe I'm not mounting it or something. The term mount is totally new to me. I have no idea what I'm doing, can someone offer some help.
 
Old 02-10-2003, 12:53 PM   #2
Mara
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Registered: Feb 2002
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If you can boot your Linux installation from cd, it's OK (it can work as a boot floppy). The only thing is that you need a floppy to copy a file to your Windows system (if you're using NTFS you can't do this directly). When the floppy is in your drive, open a terminal and type
mount /mnt/floppy
Then you should see contents of your floppy in /mnt/floppy. You can copy your file into the directory and then unmount the floppy:
umount /mnt/floppy
 
Old 02-10-2003, 01:24 PM   #3
HKILP7M8
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Registered: Feb 2003
Location: New York City
Distribution: SuSe Linux 8.1 Pro
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Thanks, I will try that. Can you tell me how to locate my boot file so I can then copy it to the floppy and then copy to the Windows boot file/loader?

Thanks in advance
 
Old 02-11-2003, 07:30 AM   #4
Allen614
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Registered: Dec 2002
Location: Plains
Distribution: Slackware 13
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This is an example using the Windows "ntldr" to boot XP,Debian,Slackware and Minslack (CLI only). I created a softlink from the /boot/image (vmlinuz or bzimage) to "/" in order to forego the pleasure of having 2 bootscreens and
booting straight to the kernel. The examples are from Slackware but they're generic. Here's an example of lilo.conf with everything commented out except the essentials.

# LILO configuration file
# generated by 'liloconfig'
#
# Start LILO global section
append="hdc=ide-scsi"
boot = /dev/hdb6
#message = /boot/boot_message.txt
#prompt
#timeout = 1
# Override dangerous defaults that rewrite the partition table:
change-rules
reset
# Normal VGA console
vga = normal
# End LILO global section
# DOS bootable partition config begins

# DOS bootable partition config ends
# Linux bootable partition config begins
image = /vmlinuz-ide-2.4.18
root = /dev/hdb6
label = Slackware
read-only
# Linux bootable partition config ends

Note that the image= is not in the /boot. Run "/sbin/lilo" If you get a "Warning" that this is not the first partition. You did good. Now create your bootsect file.

root@whatever#dd if=/dev/hdb6 of=/bootsect.slk bs=512 count=1

Copy the bootsect.slk to the drive where "ntldr" and "boot.ini" reside. (Normally Cby using a dos format floppy or e-mail it to yourself.(Not my idea but it was too cool) If your Windows drive is vfat just mount the drive and copy straight to it. Then add a line to "boot.ini" Here's mine.

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect
C:\bootsect.dbn ="Debian"
C:\bootsect.slk="Slackware"
C:\bootsect.slm="Minslack"

Reboot and pic your flavor.
 
  


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