What if I change the jumper or IDE slot
 

If I change the jumper on the hard disk, say from master to slave, or change the IDE slot, say from primary to secondary, will my Linux system still work? Will I need to boot from a floppy? Will I need to re-configure something?

We don't have to do anything if it's a Windows system. I just wonder if Linux is the same intelligent.

umm, if you don't have a 'master' drive (one of them, if more than one), bios won't recognize the os...therefore, windows won't work either.

you may have to redo lilo if you change your boot statistics.

I use GRUB as boot loader.

What should I do if I must change disk jumper and/or IDE slot?

Can you clarify the problem...are you adding a drive, are you moving this drive to slave, etc. Without these details, its hard to be more helpful.

If you have multiple drives, giving the general layout would also be helpful (ie. hda= windows, hdb1=windows, hdb2=linux, etc.)

As for IDE slot, you may get away with booting an OS off of a secondary HD, but you may need to change something in the bios.

Currently, I have RH8 running on /dev/hdb, while W2K is installed on /dev/hda.

I'm thinking about taking the RH8 disk off and mounting it on a separate machine.

I'm not sure to what extent I will need to re-configure the boot loader and how.

hmm, the problem may be that grub is installed on the MBR on hda

so, if you plan on moving this *permanently* (or for a long time), install grub on the MBR on hdb, then you should be fine (you'll also have to change the jumpers to master when you move the drive)

if this is a temporary thing, maybe just booting from floppy would be the easiest solution (when booting from floppy, you can make your own grub/lilo config, or you can just tell it when prompted to boot to the correct partition)

W2K had been installed (on hda) when I installed RH8. Where is GRUB installed in this case? On MBR of hda or hdb?

I plan to move the RH8 disk off permenantly. If I must re-install GRUM on hdb, how do I do that?

You will also have to change the /etc/fstab file to reflect the change from /dev/hdb to /dev/hda.

michaelk, do you mean that mean i don't need to reinstall anything? just modify fstab?

i just took a look at /etc/fstab

seems to me you cannot specify where you boot from in this file

yeah, /etc/fstab won't help you boot.
: )

I havent used grub, but its not much different...basically, make yourself a linux bootdisk. Transfer the hdb to the new comp, mounting it as the master (correct?). Boot the HD through the floppy, then edit grub.conf and make sure it installs itself on the MBR (maybe check the grub manpage for this part). That should do the trick.

the /etc/fstab is for later... after you install Debian, you should edit fstab to see the RH partition.

this is very clear, cuckoopint. i'll give it a try. thanks!